


super, hero

by somehowunbroken



Series: HBB 2019 [8]
Category: Men's Hockey RPF, Women's Hockey RPF
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Canon-Typical Violence, Getting Together, M/M, Mystery, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-31
Updated: 2019-10-31
Packaged: 2020-12-31 21:10:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 42,507
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21152261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/somehowunbroken/pseuds/somehowunbroken
Summary: After things went wrong with the super group JT was part of in Michigan, he left his power behind and focused solely on hockey. Now, though, it's all coming back to the surface, and JT has no choice but to get to the bottom of what happened four years ago at Barton Pond.[A superhero-hockey fusion.]





	super, hero

**Author's Note:**

> this story was an absolute _blast_ to write. i read comics, love superhero movies, and actually spent a lot of time in superhero fandoms; this story was a way to merge two things i love very dearly. i hope you enjoy reading it half as much as i enjoyed writing it!
> 
> **additional warnings:** in the end notes, i've described the temporary character death that's tagged for. if you want to know more about it before reading, check that out! also, the "canon-typical violence" is for the superhero genre, not the hockey genre, although which is worse i'll let you decide.
> 
> eternal thanks to true for his _incredible_ art! i was blown away to get something that fit so well with the story. please leave him comments on the art post!
> 
> also, as always, thanks to everyone who read this as i was writing it and after i finished; you all helped me make this the best story it could be, and i appreciate it.

"I'm just saying," Tyson says as they walk down the hallway. He's got his ever-present grin on, and JT's getting it full-force in the face and feelings combined because he has yet to learn not to look directly into the sun or something. "Dinosaur animal crackers should be a thing, and I'm sad they're not."

JT rolls his eyes. "Just because—"

"Hey," Tyson cuts in. He's frowning now, hand on JT's door handle. "You locked the door after you when you left earlier, right?"

"Yeah," JT says. "Why?"

Tyson pushes his hand forward and the door swings open. "I didn't unlock it, that's why," he says. "You must've forgotten, dude."

It's an old set of instincts that make JT reach out and grab Tyson's arm before he walks in. "Just, like," he says, already glancing around. "Let me go in first and stay behind me, okay?"

"Aww," Tyson says, grin back in place as he puts his hand over his heart. "My hero."

JT doesn't answer because he's busy walking in and noticing the things that aren't as he left them: the way the welcome mat is curled up on one corner, the table where he drops his keys not centered beneath the mirror on the wall, the light on in the living room.

"Tys," JT says under his breath, taking another step inside. "Go back outside and call the police."

"What?" Tyson asks. "JT, what's going—"

Of course, that's when the guy who broke into JT's apartment decides to come walking around the corner with the PS4 in his arms.

The next few seconds are some weird combination of time being a blur and stretching out in front of JT: the guy's eyes widen and he lets the PS4 drop, going for what JT can see is a gun tucked into his pants; Tyson inhales sharply and tries to duck; the guy raises the gun towards them and tightens his finger on the trigger; JT's hands come up quickly, pointing right at the guy. He flexes his fingers hard, and time does what it does.

Or, like. It does what it doesn't. Time stops.

"Uh," Tyson says as the PS4 halts its drop maybe two inches above the floor. The guy is frozen in place, squinting at them, trigger half-pulled. JT's brain works without him asking it to, noting that it's an older model, not well cared for, and that's probably why it hadn't fired right away. If the gun's action had been a little cleaner, this would be a whole different situation.

"Call the police," JT repeats, lowering his hands. "Tell them there was a break-in, and that I knocked the guy out, but not before he got a shot off."

"Can we go back to 'uh' first?" Tyson asks. "As in, uh, dude, I had no idea you were a super, what the fuck?"

"I'm not a super," JT says, walking towards the guy.

Tyson makes a noise. "Dude!"

"I'm not," JT repeats, finally turning to look at Tyson. "Just—I promise I'll explain? I promise. But call the cops, and go outside first, because when I drop the field the shot's gonna go off and I don't want you to get hit."

Tyson's eyes are wide, but he doesn't look like he's actually panicked. That means there's no need to treat him for shock, which is a good thing, because JT's kind of always been shit at the victim-handling side of things. "You'll explain?" he asks.

"I'll explain," JT says. He's not thinking about how, or how much, or where the fuck he's even going to start, but that's a problem for Later JT. "The cops? Please?"

"Right, yeah, sure," Tyson says. His head is going like a bobblehead, but he steps outside.

JT takes a look at his watch, then inhales deeply. First things first, he figures, getting his hands beneath the PS4 and scooping it up. The cords clack to the floor, but the console drops into his hands, and he lowers it to the floor a little ways away from the guy, then turns to face him.

He reaches out and touches the guy's shoulder, and the gun goes off immediately. It makes JT jump back, and the guy goes tumbling to the floor, the gun skittering out of reach under the key table. The guy is gasping for air, but when JT leans over to check , his eyes are closed and his fingers are lax. He'll be out for a few minutes, at least, and JT knows from long experience that the lack of oxygen will blur the guy's memories of the few minutes before he got frozen, so he won't spill the beans. The cops should be here soon, and that'll be a headache, and then after that he has to talk to Tyson about—everything.

"Today sucks," JT mutters, leaning back against the wall to wait.

-0-

Dealing with the police is weird, if only because JT's never really done it as a civilian before; there's all the, like, lying about what actually went on and that's not fun, but in the end he gets the police report filled out and charges pressed, and he promises to find a lawyer and get everything going tomorrow. Today, though, leaves him with his PS4 on the ground in the hallway, a bullet hole in the wall above his front door, a bunch of shit messed up in the living room, and Tyson sitting on the sofa with his determined face on.

"So," he says as JT sits on the floor in the living room. The guy unplugged everything and threw all the cords into a massive pile, and JT wonders if it would've been worth it to just let the guy steal all his shit so he could've replaced it and had all the cords come in boxes with whatever they belong to.

"So," JT repeats, grabbing a cord at random and looking at the ends. Stereo, probably. "You've got questions, I guess?"

"You guess," Tyson echoes. "Dude. Bud. JT. We lived together for two years, and I'm just finding out now that you're a super?"

"I'm not a super," JT says, focusing hard on the cord. "Just—don't. I'm not, okay?"

"Okay," Tyson says slowly. "Then I'm a little confused, because I definitely remember you freezing a dude in your hallway, like, an hour ago."

JT sighs and picks up another cord. "I have a power," he says. He can feel his heartbeat picking up at the admission. It's more than he's said since—in a long time. "That doesn't make me a super."

"Okay," Tyson says, and it's somehow even slower than the first time he said it. "I'm… help me out here, man. I don't even know what questions to _ask_."

"I can stop time," JT says. There's another cord in the pile for the stereo, he's sure of it, and searching for it means he doesn't have to look Tyson in the face. "Not everywhere, and not forever. It's technically called a hyperlocal time dilation field."

"Stopping time, got it," Tyson says. "Anything else in your bag of tricks, or do I get to wait for the next burglar to find out?"

"I can," JT says, frowning at the cord pile. He sighs, then glances up at Tyson before looking back at the cord pile. He stretches his hand out, then curls his fingers in, and the cords start moving, slowly at first and then faster. He has to be careful with this, because he's got the TV and the stereo and everything else all pulled out so nothing's where it should be, but the cords untangle themselves and move back to their original positions. He drops the field when the TV power cord starts plugging itself in; he's learned the hard way that his powers and electricity don't mix well.

"That's, uh," Tyson says, and when JT looks back up, his eyes are wide. "Rewinding time?"

"More or less, yeah," JT says. "Hyperlocal time stepping. I can go forward, too, but that's usually not super useful."

"Forward, too," Tyson echoes, nodding. "Cool. That's cool."

"You're freaking out," JT says. Part of him wants to stand up, to start plugging things in and rearranging them, but making sure Tyson's not actively losing his mind is more important and he knows it.

"Dude," Tyson says. "I—yes! Yes, I'm freaking out!"

"I can't fly or shoot lasers out of my eyes or anything," JT says, shrugging. "And I can't undo an injury, so don't ask me to."

"Why not?" Tyson asks, and apparently he's setting aside the freaked-out feeling to be nosy, which is so typically Tyson that JT has to bite back a smile.

"Bodies have, like," JT says, waving his hand around. "Lots of moving parts and stuff. I technically can undo an injury, I guess, but it takes a lot more out of me than just making cords fly around my apartment."

"So it's not worth you trying," Tyson says, nodding. "Right. So, like, can I ask why you're not a super, or are you just gonna go all _I'm not a super_ on me again?"

JT grimaces. "I was," he says, knowing he's being kind of snippy but not sure what he can really do about it. "I'm not anymore. Now I just play hockey."

Tyson's quiet for a little while. "I'm gonna let that go," he says as JT stands up to start reconnecting all of the cords.

It makes some of the tension drain out of JT's shoulders. "Thanks."

"You obviously hate talking about it," Tyson says, standing to help. "Like, more than you hate talking about other shit, even. I'm not gonna force you."

"But you're curious," JT fills in.

Tyson shrugs. "If you suddenly found out I could throw apples with my brain, you'd be curious too."

"That's a very specific example," JT says, glancing at him as Tyson kneels in front of the PS4 and starts plugging it in. "You sure you can't?"

"I tried every day at lunch in grade three," Tyson says cheerily. "Unless things spontaneously develop as an adult, I'm pretty sure I can't."

Trust Tyson to be able to get JT to laugh when he's this stressed. "Well, if things change, you just let me know," JT says, grinning. "They don't make you register, but you can if you want, and I know a guy."

Tyson's face lights up. "Oh my god, you know some supers?" he asks. "Could you, like, call Denverite and ask him what's up with his costume?"

JT snorts. "I don't know Denverite," he says. "And if I did, trust me, I'd already have asked him." Their local super has a skin-tight neon orange suit with the Colorado state flag emblazoned across his chest; JT's betting he's a Broncos fan, but the only thing he knows for sure is that whoever wears the suit is absolutely jacked.

"Damn," Tyson says, laughing. "I guess we'll never know."

"Sorry," JT says, leaning in to plug something into the stereo. "We'll just have to keep wondering."

Tyson hums as they work. "I'm guessing this is a 'hey, don't tell anyone' kind of situation, right?"

"Yes," JT says instantly. "You can't—I don't—"

"Hey, breathe," Tyson says, looking at JT as seriously as he ever has. "I figured, okay? I won't say anything. If you didn't tell me, I bet you didn't tell anyone else, and we can keep it that way. Just don't sparkle fingers Chara and your secret'll stay safe, man."

JT closes his eyes and laughs.

-0-

It doesn't come up again, which JT is immensely grateful for, and then—

"You have to be fucking kidding me," JT says flatly. They're standing outside Tyson's apartment this time, and it's cracked open about an inch. It's barely a week after the scene at JT's apartment. "Don't we pay for security in this place?"

"Maybe we can sue," Tyson suggests. "Is it a breach of contract if they keep letting burglars in?"

JT snorts. "No idea. Stay out here just in case, okay?"

"Oh, like hell," Tyson says. "If you're gonna sparkle fingers someone, I wanna see."

"You need a better phrase for it," JT says, pushing the door open. "My fingers don't sparkle."

"Jazz hands is already taken, dude," Tyson says as they walk in. They're not being quiet, but it's not like they're trying to sneak up on anyone. "You want a better phrase, come up with it yourself."

"I'll get on that," JT promises. "Hey, whoever you are, get the fuck out here. I'm tired."

There's a noise in the living room, and JT rolls his eyes. He glances at Tyson, who's clearly trying not to laugh. They wait for a moment in the hallway, and then Tyson snorts. "Dude, just give it up," he calls.

"Call the cops," JT says, shaking his hands and heading for the living room. "I'll take care of it."

"Yeah, yeah," Tyson says, pulling his phone out. "I still want to see."

JT rolls his eyes and steps into the living room, and—

The guy from last week is standing next to the sofa, and he's already got his gun drawn. As soon as JT rounds the corner, he shoots, and JT jumps back into Tyson, sending them both tumbling to the floor.

"Get out of here," JT says, not glancing at Tyson as he pushes himself up. "Something fucked up is going on."

"Yeah," Tyson says shakily. "Was that—"

"Police, now," JT says, and he's already got his hands out in front of him as he moves towards the living room again, cautious this time. He needs to be able to see what he's stopping, which he's definitely had the chance to regret before but finds himself doing again now anyway.

He takes a deep breath and jumps forward, aiming for where the guy had been and flexing his fingers. He hits the ground and rolls as a shot goes off, and JT pushes himself to the back of the sofa and glances around wildly as he hears the guy cock the gun again. There are feet to his right, but he can't get a good angle from where he is.

The guy laughs. "Aw, come on," he says, taking a step forward. "I didn't even get a good shot at you the other day, Ticker."

JT doesn't react outwardly, but every alarm bell he's ever had is blaring in his head. There are, at most, ten people in the world who know what code name he used to go by, and this guy doesn't resemble a single one of them. 

"Blink says hi, by the way," the guy adds, and JT reacts without another thought. He pushes himself up to his feet and vaults over the back of the sofa, tackling the guy to the ground. The gun goes skidding again, but this time the guy is grinning maniacally up at him as the time dilation sets in. It gives JT the chance to study his face, at least, but he still has no fucking idea who this guy is or why he knows who JT is.

Who he was, he reminds himself. He left that shit behind, except now it seems like it didn't actually stay there.

"JT?" Tyson calls. "I'm guessing you won, but can you confirm that for me?"

JT stands up, not taking his eyes off the guy. "I'm good," he says. "Did you make the call?"

"I did," Tyson confirms as he walks in. "So, like. What the fuck?"

"I don't know," JT says. He pulls his camera out of his pocket and snaps a few photos of the guy's face. "I have no idea who this is."

"Well, that feels like a bad sign," Tyson says. "There's no way it's coincidence that he broke into your place and then my place, right?"

"He called me by my name," JT says. "My old name."

"Your super name," Tyson clarifies. When JT nods, Tyson sighs. "Well, that's extra not good."

"Yeah," JT agrees, finally looking up at Tyson. "That's—almost nobody knows that. He shouldn't know that."

Tyson frowns. "So he knows someone who knew you," he says. "Someone who's pissed off at you, I guess?"

"He said," JT says, swallowing hard. "He said something else he shouldn't have known."

"That sounds ominous," Tyson says. "Hey, like. How long can you leave him frozen for?"

"Right," JT mutters, leaning over and touching the guy's leg. He immediately starts breathing again, gasping for air as his eyes slide shut. "He said something about—"

"Wait," Tyson cuts in, and when JT falls silent, he can hear the sound of sirens approaching. Tyson grins at him. "I'm guessing this is something you don't want the cops to overhear."

"I don't," JT agrees. "I really do want to ask them why this guy isn't still in jail, though. I guess he made bail or whatever."

"It's worth asking," Tyson agrees. "And then I vote we order takeout and go to your place and you can tell me about whatever the fuck is going on here. Sound good?"

JT wants to talk about this about the same amount he did after the last time it happened, but he nods. "We'll talk," he says. His eyes flicker to the guy on the ground. "And hopefully we can figure out some answers."

-0-

The officers from JT's break-in respond to the break-in at Tyson's; they seem baffled as to how the guy ended up in Tyson's apartment, but they promise to follow up with JT's lawyer. Tyson didn't find anything missing or out of place, so there's less paperwork to be filed this time around, which means that it doesn't take long for them to wrap up with the police and walk next door to JT's place.

"So," Tyson says.

JT sighs and pulls out his phone. It's quick work to google, so he finds an old article and tosses his phone to Tyson. "Here," he says. "That's us."

"Wait a minute," Tyson says, frowning at the phone. "You were on a team?"

"Read it," JT says. "I'll be back in a minute."

Tyson nods, still frowning, as JT walks out of the room. He takes a deep breath and walks into his bedroom, heading straight into his closet. He reaches for the top shelf in the corner, pulling down a slightly crumpled cardboard box labelled _xmas crap—outside_. There are a few red bows inside along with a string of fairy lights, and JT grabs the battery box for the lights, popping it open.

The small communication button sitting in the battery compartment is right where he left it, not giving off a light or a sound.

"Fuck," he sighs, bending to set the box on the ground. He picks the comm button up and heads back to the living room. He'll deal with the box later.

"So," Tyson says as soon as JT steps into the living room. "You're Ticker, obviously. Do I know any of the other people in this article?"

JT clenches his jaw for a second. "I'm not giving away identities," he says. "The only other one you need to know about is Blink."

"Blink," Tyson echoes, tapping at the phone screen. "Hang on, I have SuperWiki open—oh."

"Yeah," JT says quietly. "Oh."

Tyson's staring at the phone, eyes scanning the screen. "So," he says slowly. "There was an accident, and Blink… didn't make it, and that's why you're not a super anymore. The dates line up."

JT squeezes his eyes shut. "That's pretty much it, yeah."

"I'm sorry," Tyson says quietly.

JT takes a deep breath and opens his eyes. "Thanks," he says. 

"So this guy knows who you are," Tyson says, putting JT's phone down. "And he, what, mentioned Blink?"

"He did, yeah," JT says. "Which—that was four years ago. If someone was gonna come after the group for her dying, I don't get why it wouldn't be before now."

Tyson hums. "Is the rest of the group still together?"

"No," JT says. "They stayed together for a little while, but everyone's split up now."

"Weird," Tyson says. "I don't think I have a guess, man."

JT takes a deep breath and sets the comm button on the table. "I know someone who might," he says. "So you're gonna have to keep secrets for the both of us, okay? Unless you don't want that, I mean. You can leave if—"

"Dude," Tyson says, leaning in. "I thought you said you weren't going to give away identities."

"I very specifically have permission for this one," JT says. "Very, very specifically, if it ever becomes relevant, I'm allowed to tell you and only you about Keeper and only Keeper."

Tyson glances at the comm button. "Oh, now I have to know."

JT sighs and presses the comm button. It flickers to life immediately, the small holodash asking him for his information. JT recites his identification number, his super name, and the three coded passphrases that he's tried to ignore but can't help but memorise every month when he gets a new one texted to him. The comm button beeps quietly with every correct answer, and then the holodash disappears, giving way to a video screen.

"I swear to god, Ticker, if you're using this to ask me if you actually need to run your software updates or something," Keeper's voice says as the screen flickers to life.

Tyson's jaw drops as the image resolves. "You are _fucking_ kidding me right now."

"Is that Josty?" Keeper asks, both eyebrows raised high. "Okay, _now_ I'm concerned."

"_Now_ he's concerned," JT mutters. "Yeah, Keeper, that's Josty. Josty, uh. Meet Keeper, I guess."

Tyson points at the hologram. "That's Kerfy," he says, voice flat.

Alexander waves. "Technically, you're both right."

"You're fucking with me," Tyson says, glancing from the screen to JT's face. "You're a super, too? Am I the only non-super on this team?"

"No," JT and Alexander say in unison. JT shakes his head, and Alexander continues. "We're the only two. Or, well, we were, and now it's just Ticker."

"Keeper's our IT guy, more or less," JT says. "Or he was, back in the day."

"I'm good at technology," Alexander says. "Spoiler alert, I have no fucking idea what you actually did to your phone last spring, and when I told you I fixed it with magic, I wasn't actually lying."

Tyson laughs incredulously. "Shit."

"Yeah," JT says. "And now he's in Toronto, so don't drop it again or you're just gonna have to replace it like a normal human."

Alexander laughs. "You could mail it to me," he suggests. "Although if you revealed our identities over a broken iPhone, Ticker, I'm gonna be kind of upset with you."

JT's face goes serious. "It's about the break-in at my place last week," he says. "And a new break-in about two hours ago at Tyson's." He pauses. "And about Blink."

"Blink," Alexander echoes, eyes going wide. "How can anything be about Blink?"

"Well, the guy who broke into J—uh, Ticker's place last week is the same guy who broke into my place today," Tyson says. "Ticker did his time thing both times, but today he used Ticker's name and said something about Blink."

"He said 'Blink says hi, by the way,'" JT quotes. "And then I got him."

"Blink says hi, by the way," Alexander echoes. He glances away from the video screen, and JT hears the whirring that means he's booting up the supercomputer he tells everyone is a smartphone. He hasn't heard it in years, but the sound is pretty unmistakable. "Implying that Blink is alive to say hi."

"Or that he's doing something that she set up," JT adds. "I don't know, Keeper. That's why I called."

"Yeah," Alexander says, still not facing the video screen. "Have you been in touch with anyone else? Bounce or Buttercup?" He hesitates. "Section?"

"No," JT says, bristling slightly. "I called you. And if anyone's talking to Section, it's not gonna be me."

"Ticker," Alexander sighs, finally looking back at the screen. "Just because he's my teammate now—"

"Holy fuck," Tyson blurts out. "You're—I should know better than to ask if you're fucking with me right now, but _seriously_?"

JT glances over; Tyson has SuperWiki up again, and he's pulled up Section's bio page. JT winces; he'd always said that someone was gonna make Section based on his lack of disguise, and given Tyson's expression, he has. "Yeah," he grumbles. "So Zach Hyman is also a super. He can… put people into bubbles, more or less." He motions with his hands. "Sectioning people away from each other."

"Holy shit," Tyson mutters.

"And he's Ticker's ex," Alexander supplies _extremely_ unhelpfully.

"Holy _shit_," Tyson says again, turning to JT with wide eyes.

JT sighs and puts his head in his hands as Alexander starts laughing. His friends are the worst.

-0-

JT forwards the burglar's photo to Alexander and does his best to not think about the whole thing for a little while. He needs to nap soon, and then he has a game to play, so he really needs to turn his brain off and sleep for a little while. The last thing he needs is to let this affect hockey.

"Hey, uh," Tyson says, glancing at the door when JT starts to make noises about napping. "Look, I know this is kind of lame, but I don't know if I feel safe by myself right now?"

JT blinks at him, then thinks about everything Tyson's learned in the past handful of hours. "You want to stay? You can stay."

Tyson breathes out loudly. "It's dumb, I know."

"Dude, someone broke into your apartment a few hours ago, and you don't have any powers," JT says, shrugging. "Let's go get your shit and then come back here. We're gonna have to share, because I don't have the sheets on the spare bed, but you can stay over."

Tyson gives him a small relieved grin. "Thanks, man."

"No problem," JT replies.

It's quick work to get stuff for Tyson to sleep in and his suit for later; Tyson grabs his travel toiletries bag and a pillow, too, and JT bites back a grin, thinking back to last year and Tyson always insisting on bringing his pillow out to the sofa for roommate movie night. It's hard to miss living with someone when you move in literally next door to each other, but JT still finds ways to do it.

"Okay, that's enough," Tyson says, glancing around.

"If we forgot something, it's not like it's a long trip to get it," JT says. "C'mon, nap time."

"Nap time," Tyson agrees, following JT out of his apartment and back into JT's. They dump most of his stuff in the living room, and then they both trudge down the hallway towards the bedroom. It doesn't take them long to change and get in bed, and JT moves towards the middle as Tyson scoots back towards him. They've shared a bed enough times to know that they're going to wake up wrapped around each other, and it's more restful for both of them if they just cuddle up to start with. JT doesn't think about how easily he falls asleep with Tyson in his arms, but that's only because he's got a lot of practice at ignoring that particular fact.

Their nap is uneventful; it's a nice change from the rest of the day, JT thinks as they wake up to the alarm. Tyson hums and burrows into his chest, which is par for the course with how much he hates waking up, and JT smiles, which is also par for the course in this particular situation.

"Hey, game day," he says, nudging at Tyson's side. "Gotta get up, Tys."

"No," Tyson whines, rubbing his face against JT's shirt. "Coach can scratch me. I don't wanna."

JT snorts. "I'm taking the covers with me when I get up," he warns. "You have, like, thirty seconds."

Tyson sighs outrageously, then opens his eyes and blinks up at JT, a sleepy smile on his face. "You're mean."

"Uh," JT says, momentarily distracted by all the Tyson in his proximity. "Sorry?"

"You aren't," Tyson says, rolling away from him. "And I don't even have Kerfy here to be in my corner. This is the worst."

JT watches him get up for a long three-count before forcing himself to sit up. "Well, you can't use the comm button to contact him," he says. "That's for powers-only stuff."

Tyson scowls. "And I can't text him about powers-only stuff," he says. "Since it's not secure."

"Sorry," JT says, shrugging. "It's safer that way."

"I need a button thing," Tyson says, disappearing into the bathroom.

JT frowns as he closes the door. He grabs his phone from the bedstand and opens up his messages. _hey any chance we can get tys a walkie talkie?_

Alexander's typing bubbles pop up, disappear, and pop up again. _bud_, he gets a moment later, but before he says anything else, Alexander sends _fine_.

JT grins at his phone, then tosses it to the side as Tyson comes out of the bathroom, hair more or less tamed. "All yours," he says.

It's mostly a blur of getting ready for the game after that; it's a routine that's so ingrained in both of them by now that JT doesn't know if anything could break them out of it. They move around each other like clockwork, getting food ready and then getting dressed and heading out the door together. It's a game day like any other game day, when it comes down to it, except that JT now has his comm button tucked into the inside pocket of his suit jacket.

There's nothing to do but get ready for the game, though, so JT puts his head down as they arrive and makes quick work out of changing into his jersey. He's tempted to tuck his comm button into his pads, but Tyson grabs his wrist and raises an eyebrow when he reaches into his suit pocket.

"Just play," he says quietly. "If there's any news, it'll still be there when the game's over."

JT sighs and lets his hand drop. "Fine," he mutters. "I'm not happy about it, but fine."

Tyson's grin is bright. "Thanks," he says, knocking their hips together before grabbing his chest pads and pulling them on.

JT jumps when a giant hand lands on his shoulder. "Hey," EJ says, grinning at him. "Everything okay over here?"

"Yeah, we're good," JT says. He'll never say it out loud or anything like that, but there's something totally trustworthy about EJ, something calming. It feels super weird to say that about the guy who's essentially the class clown, but JT's always been kind of close to EJ, and he knows EJ will have his back if shit goes down during a game.

"Okay," EJ says, smile still in place. "Let me know if that changes. I'll kick anybody's ass, you know that."

JT pictures EJ in his living room, throwing haymakers at the burglar, and it makes him snicker. "Thanks," he says, finally grinning back. "I'll let you know."

"You do that," EJ says, shaking JT's shoulder before letting go and wandering away.

JT's still grinning as he turns back to his stall to finish getting ready.

-0-

There's a text on JT's phone when the game is over, and it's four scowling faces from a contact who's in his phone under the same scowling face. He snorts and sets his phone back in his stall.

"Dude, who's angry?" Tyson asks. JT glances over at him; he's already ready to go, and he's close enough that he definitely saw the text. He's grinning, and both of his eyebrows are up.

"Eichs," JT says nonchalantly. He hesitates for a second, then taps at the pocket where his comm button is. "He's just a regular _Buttercup_ sometimes."

Tyson's brow creases, then his eyes go wide. "Uh, yeah," he says. "Super chill, all the time."

"Yeah," JT says. He reaches up to finish tying his tie, then grabs his phone and keys. "Ready?"

"Yeah," Tyson says, quickly falling into step with him as they leave the Pepsi Center. He glances at JT's phone. "So, uh. Why is Eichs angry?"

"It's just his face," JT says, shrugging. He's got a feeling it's more than that; the Leafs didn't play tonight and neither did the Sabres, so JT's willing to bet that Alexander brought Zach and Eichs both in on everything. His only hope is that the other remaining member of his old team hasn't been read in yet; by the lack of other texts on his phone, though, he's safe for now.

Tyson snorts. "Yeah, okay," he says. "That's fair. But usually he's not texting you about his face, unless I missed something, so…"

JT sighs as he unlocks the car. He nods at the door and he and Tyson climb in, and as JT had expected, Tyson raises an eyebrow at him. "I mean, I don't know for sure," he says, putting the keys in the ignition. "But I'm willing to bet that Keeper told him what was going on, and now he has opinions about it."

"Right, yeah," Tyson says. He snorts. "I'm not shocked that Eichs, of all people, has opinions on something. I barely know the guy, but I'm somehow still not shocked."

"Yeah, you shouldn't be," JT says as he starts the car. "There's a reason he's just an angry emoji in my contacts."

"You're not wrong, it is just kind of how his face is," Tyson says. "I do have to ask how he got his name, though. There's no way he chose Buttercup."

JT grins. "Nobody got to pick their own," he says. "We came up with a few ideas for everybody as a group, and then we voted on them. He's the only one who voted against Buttercup, so that's what he's stuck with."

Tyson laughs. "Oh, I bet he was thrilled."

"Totally," JT says, heading towards home. "Bounce thought it was the funniest shit ever, so everyone called him Buttercup all the time. That's around when his contact got changed, too."

"Ticker and Section make sense, sort of," Tyson says. "Keeper, I guess that's because he keeps information or whatever. What the fuck does Buttercup do?"

"Beats the shit out of people," JT says, straight-faced.

There's a beat of silence, and then Tyson tips his head back and laughs, loud and raucous. "That's perfect," he says, clearly delighted. "Oh my god, he's your tank and his name is fucking _Buttercup_. Can you even imagine getting your ass handed to you by a guy named Buttercup?"

"Can and have," JT says, grinning. "Look, there's a reason he doesn't have a HockeyFights page. He would absolutely destroy people, and he's afraid that if he fights in the middle of a game, he'll lose his control and end up seriously injuring someone. It's not worth it."

"Jesus, yeah," Tyson says, grimacing. "That would be pretty terrible."

"It would," JT agrees. "I try not to worry about it, because his control is honestly insane, but I also try to not let Z near him when we play the Sabres, y'know?"

Tyson snorts. "Fair," he agrees. "So are all supers hockey players? Last week I would've said no way, but now I'm not so sure."

"No, not even close," JT says. "There are a bunch playing other sports, too. It makes sense when you think about it; if someone with powers decides to put the physical training in to be an actual super, then they're physically fit enough. It's easy to keep the training going if your day job is playing football or baseball or whatever."

"Huh," Tyson says. "I guess I never thought of it that way."

JT shrugs. "Most people don't. It lets a lot of people keep their cover."

"Good point," Tyson says. "So, uh."

There's a quiet beeping from JT's suit jacket. It's two quick pulses, then a longer beep, then another two pulses.

"Do you need to, like," Tyson says. JT doesn't have to look at him to realise he's staring at JT's pocket. "Get that?"

"Not right now. When it makes that alert noise, it's a message," JT says, fingers tightening on the wheel. "From Bounce."

"Bounce," Tyson echoes. "The one I don't know."

"You know her," JT mutters. "You've met her a bunch of times, actually."

"That doesn't actually narrow it down," Tyson says slowly. "Is it another ex? Did you date everyone on your superhero team?"

JT makes a face. "No, it wasn't like that," he says. "The only one I ever did anything with was Section, so you can save yourself from asking if I ever slept with Buttercup."

"We're absolutely coming back to that whole Section thing later," Tyson says. "But now I need to know why you won't tell me who Bounce is, especially if it's someone I already know."

JT sighs and pulls to a stop at a red light, then digs his comm button out of his pocket. He taps the button to play the message, quickly going through the voice confirmations that let him check what's essentially an answering machine for text, voice, and video messages all rolled into one. There's a text message there, and JT sighs.

"It's gonna read the message out loud," JT says. "Keeper programmed this thing, so it sounds like him, but it's not actually from him."

"Okay," Tyson says. "Is this gonna answer my question?"

JT grimaces. "Maybe."

He hits the button again and sets it down as the light turns green, and a moment later, Alexander's voice comes out of the button. "Ticker," he says calmly, "would you like to maybe explain why Section just texted me to ask if you were okay? And don't give me any bullshit about him texting me because he's not going to text you, because you know damn well that's not what I'm asking you about here."

Tyson whistles. "Whoever she is—"

JT holds up a hand. "She's not done yet."

"Anyway, call me, asshole," Alexander's voice continues. "Also, you're doing great with family shit all over the place this week. Mom's wondering why you haven't called her since your last game, so make sure you do that before she starts getting sad. Bounce out."

There's a small beep, and then it goes silent in the car. JT stares out the windshield, hoping Tyson buys that he needs to concentrate fully and completely on navigating down their street and pulling into a parking space.

Tyson waits until JT puts the car in park, and then he coughs. "Bounce is your _sister_?"

JT winces. "Yeah."

"Holy shit," Tyson says, blinking when JT turns to face him. "Is your whole family—do they all have powers?"

"Yeah," JT says again. "It tends to do that, actually."

"Holy shit," Tyson says again. He stares at JT for a moment more, then shakes his head. "Let's get inside so you can call her back."

"Yeah," JT mutters. "Let's get it over with."

-0-

JT sends a quick text as they head inside and gets an okay in response, so he grabs Tyson's arm when he makes noises about heading back to his own apartment. "Uh," he says, glancing away. "Bounce is cool with you sitting in."

Tyson grins. "Do I have to call her Bounce? Because I have to tell you, that's gonna be weird. I'm gonna slip and call her Jesse a lot, probably."

JT snorts hard. "Don't call her Jesse," he advises, grinning as he pulls out his comm button. "Like, whatever you do."

"Okay," Tyson says agreeably, sitting on the sofa. JT goes through the initialisation process on his comm button, pinging his sister this time instead of Alexander. It beeps softly for a moment, and then the video screen resolves.

"Uh, hey," JT says, waving.

"'Hey,' he says. Can you _believe_ this guy?" Morgan asks, gesturing to JT and presumably looking at Tyson. "I find out that someone broke into your apartment from your _ex_ instead of you, and all you have is 'hey?'"

"Uh," Tyson says, and when JT looks over, he bursts out laughing.

"Sorry," he says, glancing back at the projection. "He, uh, assumed you were my other sister, and I didn't correct him, so—"

Morgan's irritation disappears instantly, and she laughs at Tyson. "Surprise," she says, stepping back so the camera picks up her jazz hands. "Bounce at your service."

"I'm sorry," Tyson says. His face is so red. "Oh my god, I'm so sorry."

"It's whatever," Morgan says, still grinning. She shakes her head after a moment and looks at JT. "_You're_ not whatever. Ticker, what the hell?"

"I didn't realise it was a big deal until today," JT protests. "Anybody's house can get broken into."

"Except yours was targeted," Morgan says. "And now someone else is involved."

"I'm right here," Tyson says. "And, whatever, now I'm involved."

Morgan sighs. "It's protocol for us not to use real names over the comms," she says. "Force of habit, since we used to use them in the field. Sorry, Tyson."

Tyson's whole face lights up. "Wait, does that mean I can get a code name?"

JT opens his mouth to protest, but Morgan grins and leans in. "I mean, sure, but you don't get to pick your own."

"Oh, yeah, Ticker told me," Tyson says, snickering. "I heard about Buttercup today."

"Buttercup," Morgan says gleefully. "Aw, how's my favourite angry troll doing?"

"Text him yourself," JT says, rolling his eyes, but he's grinning. "I just got a bunch of angry faces. I'll call him later."

"Sounds like everything's normal for him, then," Morgan says, laughing. "Anyway, Section asked me if you were okay, so I'm guessing you should reach out to him. Keeper told him you're fine, I'm sure, but he's still…"

JT sighs. "He's still Section."

"He sure is," Morgan says. "Just because he's all grown up and married now doesn't mean he doesn't give a shit about you, so you should try to pretend you're grown up enough to talk to him, probably."

"If you and your sister magically manifest powers together, don't team up with her," JT says flatly to Tyson, who looks like Christmas has come early with how hard he's smiling. "She's already on your case for everything all the time, and it won't get better."

"Yeah, for sure," Tyson agrees, laughing.

Morgan snorts. "Tell me what happened," she says, looking back to JT. "I got it third-hand from Section. Give me the non-telephone version."

JT sighs and does, outlining the first break-in and then the one earlier today, including what the guy had said. "It's weird," he finishes. "The first one was, like, a pretty generic break-in, I guess. We got back here, there was a guy inside, he was trying to take my shit. The second one was the same guy, but it was like he was just… waiting for us."

"I don't think he touched any of my stuff at all," Tyson adds. "Why break in if you're not going to take stuff?"

"It wasn't the same guy," Morgan says slowly. "Ticker, Section said you have a photo?"

JT frowns and opens his phone, sending the photo to Morgan.

"It was for sure the same guy," Tyson says. "Like, he had a whole personality transplant in the last week, but it was absolutely the same guy."

"Bounce," JT asks, watching as Morgan frowns offscreen, probably at her phone. "What are you thinking?"

"Do you remember Mask?" Morgan asks, still frowning. "He wasn't one of our usual rogue supers. He just popped in at one point, and he could change his face to disguise himself."

It rings a bell, JT thinks vaguely. "Sure," he says. "But that's not the same face, that's the same entire person."

Morgan nods and looks back up at them. "So this person has something similar," she says. "Except he can do his whole body, not just his face."

"Sure, okay," JT says, frowning. "Why?"

"Because he couldn't tell you who he really is," Tyson says, and JT turns to look at him. Tyson shrugs. "Look, it makes sense, right? Either he didn't want you to be able to identify him later, or it's somebody you already know who didn't want you knowing who they were."

"Or he chose to take the form of the guy who already broke in because then we'd pick up on the fact that something was wrong," Morgan adds, nodding. "It explains the break-ins being so different. One was actually a burglary, but the other one was just someone trying to make his presence known. He had no interest in actually taking any of your stuff."

"Cool, but like," Tyson says, frowning. "Dude had a gun. If Ticker hadn't been with me…"

There's silence for a moment before JT sighs. "Yeah, okay, you're staying here until we figure out what's going on."

"That's not," Tyson starts.

Morgan interrupts. "You're staying there," she says in the firm tone of older sisters everywhere. Just because she's actually younger than JT doesn't mean she doesn't have the voice down pat; she spent enough time leading their super team to perfect it. "We'll get you set up with some security, and I'll talk to Keeper about getting you a comm button for emergencies."

"I, uh," JT says. "I might've already asked about that."

Tyson's face does something complicated before settling on happy. "Cool," he says, smiling. "I'm probably gonna need flash cards on how to use it, though."

"Yeah, join the club," Morgan says, and her voice is upbeat. Tyson probably doesn't catch the concern in the look on her face, but that's fine. JT knows it's there, and he's already feeling it himself, but he'll make sure it's all okay. Like _fuck_ is he letting anything happen to Tyson.

-0-

The conversation with Eichs goes a lot more smoothly, if only because Eichs is way more allergic to feelings than JT is, so he doesn't press against any of JT's relationship issue buttons. He's mostly just in a bad mood because the Sabres are, yet again, a shitshow, and being mad about someone breaking into JT's space and talking about their dead teammate is easier than being mad that no matter what changes happen outwardly, the Sabres still can't pull their shit together where it matters.

"Well, if you need me to come punch a face or two, just buzz me," Eichs says after a fifteen-minute rant about people having the audacity to be shitty, as if that fact is new or noteworthy in any way. "It's the only fucking thing I'm good at, and I don't get anywhere near enough chances to use it anymore."

"You could always put the suit on and go walk down dark alleys when you're in New York on road trips," JT offers. "It doesn't have to be a super crime for you to stop it."

Eichs makes a face. "If I do that without backup, Keeper and Bounce will team up to murder me in my sleep, and you know it."

"There are a billion supers in New York," JT counters. "Find a friend, Buttercup."

"I'll find _you_ a friend," Eichs mutters, and then he flips JT off and cuts the call.

Tyson wanders in as JT's pocketing his comm button. He doesn't really miss the suit he had when he was actively being a super—sixteen-year-olds make terrible fashion choices, and JT will gladly throw his past self's design ideas under the bus—but it had at least had a place for him to keep it on himself easily. Jeans pockets really don't have the same kind of protection for the comm button, and JT finds himself patting his pockets to make sure it didn't slip out unnoticed far too frequently.

"Hey," Tyson says. "I heard the yelling stop, so I figured you were done."

JT grins. He and Eichs are a little too alike sometimes, but they get along well. "Yeah, he ran out of things to yell about," he says.

"Kinda doubt that," Tyson says with a laugh. "Anyway, I was gonna ask about sheets for the spare bed, since apparently I'm under orders from your sister to stay here for a while."

"You'll listen to her, but not me," JT says, rolling his eyes.

"You can stop time, but SuperWiki says Bounce can shoot shit out of her hands," Tyson says. "No offense, buddy, but that's scarier."

JT makes a face. "It's not bullets or anything," he says. "It's rubber balls."

"Yeah, Bounce, I got it," Tyson says, nodding. "I am _very_ sure you know what it feels like if she's aiming at you, so don't give me that shit."

"Fine," JT says, smiling reluctantly. "It hurts."

"I don't want to find out how much," Tyson says, smiling back. "Sheets?"

"Right, yeah," JT says, standing from the table. "They should be in the linen closet."

"The what?" Tyson asks, following him down the hall.

JT glances back over his shoulder. "We have literally the same apartment," he says pulling the closet door open. "What do you have in this closet?"

Tyson's face brightens. "Oh, the pantry."

"The," JT says, blinking. "You keep food in here?"

"There's nowhere to keep it in the kitchen," Tyson says, shrugging. "You keep towels in it, I see."

"It's next to the bathroom," JT says, gesturing. "That's what it's _for_. There's no pantry in these apartments."

"That's dumb, and I don't have enough towels to need a whole closet for them," Tyson says. "Where do you keep your food?"

"In the cabinets, in the _kitchen_," JT says, turning back to the closet. Towels, towels, more towels, and no sheets to be seen. JT frowns. "Where the fuck are the sheets?"

"Ha," Tyson says triumphantly. "Some fancy closet you have. Your sheets aren't even in it."

"Yeah, but that means I don't actually know where they are," JT says. "Which means they're probably at the bottom of the laundry pile, so they're not clean."

Tyson shrugs. "So we share again for the night, and we dig them out in the morning," he suggests. "That's not gonna kill either one of us."

"Yeah," JT says. "Sorry I'm, like, a shitty host or whatever."

"Right, I was expecting a five-star stay," Tyson says with a snort. "Whatever, dude."

"Yeah, whatever," JT mutters as Tyson brushes past him to go into the bedroom. He glares at the linen closet. Traitor.

Tyson's already half-changed when JT walks in, standing in the bedroom in his boxers and socks. He turns to smile at JT. "Hey, can I borrow a shirt? I tossed mine in the laundry pile earlier, and if it's in there with sheets you haven't washed in so long you literally forgot about them, then I don't want to grab it back out."

JT snorts. "Since when do you care about that?"

"Since I have no idea how long it's been since you actually cleaned any of that," Tyson returns, waving at the laundry pile. "If the shirt's a problem—"

"It's not," JT says, rolling his eyes. "Just grab one and let's go to sleep."

Tyson laughs. "Yeah, sure," he says. He pulls the dresser drawer open, and JT leaves him to it while he grabs some of the laundry off the floor. He can set it to run while they sleep, and then tomorrow he can dig through the rest of it to find the sheets. He should get better at laundry, probably, but that's not happening tonight.

JT has to stop short when he walks back in, because Tyson's already in bed, fucking around on his phone. He's got one of JT's Michigan shirts on, and he's smiling at whatever he's looking at, and it's been a long, exhausting day. JT swallows hard and turns to the dresser, grabbing whatever he touches first to change into before getting in the bed.

"Hey," Tyson says, putting his phone in his lap and turning to JT. "Thanks. For all of this."

"Of course," JT says gruffly. "We'll figure all of this out, and then you can go back home. Like hell would I put you in any more danger when I could've prevented it."

Tyson's face goes soft. "Aw."

"No," JT says sternly. "We're not talking about it. We're going to sleep."

"Sure, sure," Tyson says, laughing, but he puts his phone on the bedstand and curls up with JT when he turns the lights off, so JT's counting it as a win anyway.

-0-

Timing is weird, sometimes; JT keeps track of the hockey schedule, but it's not always at the forefront of his mind, so he doesn't actually realise that the Leafs are going to be in town until he gets a text that Alexander got the okay to miss curfew the night before they play.

"Sweet," Tyson says, grinning hard. "Dude. Do you think he has my comm button?"

"I don't know for sure, but he's usually quick with that kind of shit," JT says, smiling when Tyson fistpumps. "We're gonna have to share him, though. I don't think we're gonna get away with just hogging him for the whole night."

"Roommates forever," Tyson says instantly. He frowns after he says it. "Do you think Hyman's gonna come over, too?"

JT groans. "Probably."

"Dude," Tyson says, frowning harder. "Is there anything I should know before that happens?"

It makes JT make a face and he knows it, but he shrugs. "I mean," he says. "We were together, and then we broke up."

"Wow, thanks," Tyson says dryly. "I didn't know any of that already. It's super helpful."

"He got serious and I got scared," JT snaps. "Is that what you wanted me to say?"

Tyson looks taken aback. "Whoa," he says, holding up both hands. "I—sorry. That sucks."

JT sighs and pushes a hand through his hair. "Things are weird with supers," he says. "Like, you're constantly in danger, whether you think about it or not. We were together for a year, and then things went down with Blink and I freaked about _everything_. Section—Zach—he sat down with me and tried to talk me down, and he started talking about the future, about us."

"Which didn't go over well," Tyson says.

"Things with Blink..." JT starts, but he shakes his head after a moment. "No part of me gave a shit about the future right then, and I didn't want to hear him promising me a good one after—after that. I told him I needed to think, and then I just kind of… left."

"You left," Tyson says. "Like. Left where you were talking?"

"And the state shortly after," JT says. His laugh is hollow. "And I refused to talk to him, or to anyone else on my team. I signed my hockey contract here and I fucking fled. Morgan's the only super I talked to for a goddamn year."

"A year," Tyson echoes. "And then Kerfy signed here."

"And then Keeper fucking followed me, yeah," JT says. "And you thought we should all live together, and he was all over that idea. I didn't know how to say no without being a dick, and I was kind of done being a dick at that point."

"Could've fooled me," Tyson says, grinning crookedly. "Shit. I'm sorry I pushed you into that."

"You had no idea," JT says. He inhales deeply and holds his breath for a moment before letting it out slowly. "It was good for me, though, having him around. He was always the calm one."

"I want to ask you what happened with Blink, but I feel like that might be something you don't want to talk about," Tyson says after a moment.

JT closes his eyes. "I really don't," he says quietly. "I promise I will. It's probably important to all of this, but…"

"But you just had more than two emotions in a short amount of time, and there's only so much your body can handle in a day," Tyson says. He grins when JT opens his eyes to glare at him. "As if I'm wrong."

"You're not wrong," JT says. "But I don't have to like it."

"I'm pretty sure you're actually not supposed to like it," Tyson says. "That's another emotion, and the whole problem here is the number of emotions, so—"

"I'm going to kick your ass," JT says.

Tyson grins at him, big and bright, before his face goes serious. "If you don't want Hyman here, I'll talk to Kerfy about it," he says. "We can just be roommates again, like old times."

"I should talk to him," JT says, closing his eyes again. "At the absolute least, I should fucking apologise. He was—it was serious, and I ran out on him in the middle of the night. That was fucked up."

"Yeah," Tyson says quietly. There's silence for a moment, and then JT feels Tyson's fingers graze lightly against the back of his hand. "I don't know him that well, but I bet he gets it now."

JT snorts. "He's kind of annoyingly perfect, so you're probably right," he says. "I should still apologise."

"Probably," Tyson agrees. "I'm gonna reserve the right to throw him out on his ass if he's a dick to you, though."

JT opens his eyes and turns to look at Tyson. "You're gonna throw him out of my apartment?"

"Well, you won't, so somebody's gotta," Tyson replies, shrugging a shoulder. "Also, we should find the sheets for the spare bed. Your bed is comfortable, but I think if we put Kerfy in it with us, it's gonna be more than a little cramped."

JT laughs, some of the tension easing from his shoulders. "Yeah," he agrees. "I'll look through the whole laundry pile. I've been meaning to do that anyway."

"It's not like I mind sharing," Tyson says, grinning at him. "We're awesome at sharing."

"We are," JT agrees. "We've had enough practice. I'm glad we don't suck at it."

"Practice makes perfect," Tyson says, his voice going deep in an imitation of Coach's.

JT bites the inside of his cheek so he doesn't correct Tyson the way his mom always does: _practice makes permanent_. He's probably too used to waking up with Tyson's curls in his face as it is; he doesn't need to make it worse for himself. They're going to figure out the whole fake burglar knowing about Blink thing, and then Tyson's going home, he reminds himself. Tyson's going back to his own apartment, and JT will go back to waking up alone in his bed.

He doesn't have any trouble believing it. It's being okay with it that's going to take some time.

-0-

As soon as someone knocks on the door, Tyson jumps off the sofa and darts for it.

"Hold the fuck on," JT says. He reaches out and halts the deadbolt mid-slide; now that Tyson knows about his powers it's kind of funny to use them in ways that Tyson isn't expecting, but this one's important, not like JT halting his orange juice mid-pour. For all that they're expecting company, that doesn't mean the person on the other side of the door is automatically Alexander.

"Right," Tyson says, sighing as JT touches his shoulder. He moves out of the way quickly, though, and JT taps a quick rhythm on the door.

There's a quick series of taps back, and JT grins as he unlocks the door and pulls it open. "Hey," he says, pulling Alexander into a hug. "How's it going?"

"Good," Alexander says, leaning into JT hard for a moment before pulling back. He looks good, JT notes as he turns to Tyson. "Hey."

"Hi," Tyson says, yanking him into a hug.

Alexander laughs and stumbles into him, and JT grins at them for a moment until someone clears their throat, and—

Right.

"Hey," JT says, turning back to the hallway. "Uh. How's it going?"

Zach smiles at him, and JT's whole chest does something really unfortunate. "Going pretty good," he says. "You?"

"Good, yeah," JT says, and god, he knew this was going to be awkward, but this is awful. He steps back. "C'mon in."

"Thanks," Zach says, stepping inside. He glances around. "Nice place."

"It works," JT says, shrugging.

"Except for when people break in, apparently," Zach says, and this time when he looks around, it's Section, not JT's ex. It's familiar territory, which makes it easier to deal with, so JT nods. "Any leads?"

"No," Alexander says, and when JT turns to look at him, he's narrowing his eyes at them, one arm still slung around Tyson's waist. He points at JT, then at Zach. "You two need to fucking talk like adults before you talk shop."

"We," JT starts, but Alexander scowls.

"I'm taking Josty next door to see if I can pick anything up," he says. "Use your words, or so help me, I'll make it so both of your phones only call each other until you do. Try explaining _that_ one to your wife." He reaches out and pokes Zach in the arm, then shakes his head. "Just talk, okay?"

"Yeah, okay," Zach says. He doesn't look at JT as Alexander pulls Tyson out into the hallway, and the door closing behind them doesn't make him look up.

"So," JT starts, because this is his fuckup, and he can be big enough to start the conversation. Probably.

"So," Zach agrees. His gaze flicks up to meet JT's for a moment before he looks down and smiles. "We didn't used to be this shitty at talking to each other."

"That was before you proposed and I ran away in a blind panic," JT says as neutrally as he can manage.

Zach shrugs. "Can we sit?" he asks, glancing towards the living room. "I have some stuff I need to say, and it sounds like you do, too."

"I might be done," JT says, because it's easy to fall back into their old patterns, and teasing each other is always how they related best. "You don't know."

Zach gives him a brief smile. "Well, then, maybe I don't want to stand anymore."

"Fine, then let's go sit," JT says, walking past Zach into the living room. He doesn't sprawl across the entire sofa, because he isn't actually a kid anymore, so there's plenty of room for Zach to sit on the other side.

"So I'm sorry," Zach starts, and JT blinks.

"You're fucking what now?" JT asks. "For _what_?"

Zach breathes out hard. "I was just as messed up over Blink as you were," he says quietly. "And I panicked, because all I could think about in the moment was losing you. I knew you weren't ready yet, but I asked you to marry me because I didn't know how else to ask you to _stay_."

JT swallows hard, and then swallows again, because he can't get the lump in his throat to go away. "And then I left anyway."

"And then you left anyway," Zach agrees. There's a faint smile on his face, but it's twisted up with all kinds of old hurt. Just because they're not close anymore doesn't mean JT isn't fully aware of the minutiae in every single one of Zach's expressions. "And I wanted to go after you so badly, but Bounce, uh."

JT's eyebrows shoot up. "What the fuck did _Bounce_ do?" This is news to him. As far as he'd known, Blink died and he ran, and the rest of the team quietly scattered. He knows that couldn't have been the whole truth of it, but he'd never heard otherwise, not from Morgan and not from Alexander.

"She told me that if I didn't let you have your space, she'd use me for target practice," Zach says dryly. "And we both know that she's better than I am."

"She is," JT agrees, because he's always going to be in Morgan's corner, but it's also just the truth. "She's better than any of us ever were. Except—"

"Blink," Zach finishes quietly. He's silent for a moment before he sighs. "I know you weren't okay then, but are you? Now?"

JT stares at the coffee table and sighs heavily. "When I don't think about it, I'm fine," he says after a moment. "It's easier if I'm too tired to dream, too."

"Yeah," Zach says, and he's letting JT hear exactly how haunted his voice is. It's a familiar tone, unfortunately, because that's what JT sounds like if he lets himself think about the whole situation. "Look, it's not my place anymore—"

"I'm sorry," JT blurts out, because the longer he sits here, the more he needs to say it. "I should have just talked to you."

"You were traumatised," Zach says. "I'm not saying I never blamed you, but I got it. I get it."

"And I'm still sorry about it," JT says, making himself look Zach in the eyes. "Maybe you shouldn't have said it, but I shouldn't have run."

Zach gives him half a smile, which is more than JT feels like he could manage right now. "So we both fucked up, and we both feel bad about it," he says. "Can we maybe be friends?"

"We can try," JT offers. "I might be bad at that, too. Like, worse than I was as a boyfriend."

"You were not a bad boyfriend," Zach says instantly. He frowns, glancing back towards the door. "And I'm guessing you still aren't, because I know Josty talks to Kerf a lot, and I'm sure I would've gotten a warning if you were being a dick."

JT blinks. "I don't follow," he says cautiously.

"You don't follow," Zach repeats blankly. "You… aren't dating Josty?"

JT feels his jaw drop a little, so he slams it shut. "No?"

"Wait, really?" Zach says, frowning at him. "I sort of want to ask you if you're sure, but I feel like that would be weird."

"Yes, I'm sure," JT says. "What the hell?"

Zach's jaw works for a minute, and JT waits him out, because he'll get there eventually. "You just," he says finally. "I only saw you guys together for a minute before Kerf dragged him next door, but you look at him like you used to look at me."

JT breathes in and out evenly for a moment. "Yeah, well," he says, because he's not going to deny it or whatever. "Just because I—"

The front door swings open, and both of them spring up, Zach slightly ahead of JT even as they both hold their hands up, ready for whoever's bursting in. Tyson comes around the corner a second later, and JT drops his hands as Alexander follows.

"So," Alexander says, holding up a fist. He opens it up, and JT sees something small and dark in his palm. It's surrounded by the gentle orange glow that means Alexander's controlling it, which means it's something electronic. "Your friend left some gifts behind."

-0-

The thing about giving up his life as a super to play pro hockey is that JT sort of expected he'd be able to _do_ it.

It had worked for a while, too; yeah, Alexander had been around as a reminder, and yeah, sometimes JT read about what Denverite got up to and had a "what if" train of thought, but he hadn't had to use his power since he decided to leave it behind, hadn't faced a situation where it even occurred to him to do so. Not until the first break-in.

He's trying not to be bitter about the fact that he's sitting in his living room now, comm buttons patching Eichs and Morgan in while he stares at the evidence that him leaving his super team behind didn't actually mean he'd left his life as a super in the past as well. It's… not really working.

"So we've got some bugs that lead back to somewhere in Michigan," Eichs says. He's frowning more than usual. "And they were left in Doodle's apartment, not Ticker's."

"We're working under the assumption that the first break-in really was just a break-in, and the second one is the one that matters," Zach says. He's got a notebook on the table, and JT feels an annoying flare of fondness in his chest at the sight of it. "If our guy was only responsible for the second break-in, then it makes sense that they're not in Ticker's apartment."

"Kind of dumb to assume that out of the two of us, I'm the one who needs to be watched, I think," Tyson says. "Also, I'm super into the idea of a nickname, but Doodle? Really?"

Morgan snorts. "You know you don't get to pick your own," she says. "And it's not like we had a power set to work with. Doodle works as well as anything else. We haven't voted on it, though, so if anyone has suggestions..."

"He did say something about wanting to be able to throw apples with his brain when he found out about me," JT offers.

"Applesauce," Morgan declares instantly, leaning towards the camera with a huge grin on her face. "I propose Applesauce. All in favour?"

JT raises his hand instantly, grinning as he sees that everyone else is raising their hands, too.

"Awesome," Morgan says. "This is your official welcome to the team, Applesauce. Now that that's settled, can we talk about the actual problem at hand?"

"Applesauce," Zach says with a straight face, and JT's not in love with him anymore, but he'd consider kissing him just for pulling that off. "Can you think of any reason someone might want to bug your place?"

Tyson shrugs. "Not really," he says, frowning. "I mean, we're only there half the time, and we're here the rest of the time. It's not like we talk about super stuff a ton anyway, but I think the only super thing that happened in my place was Ticker freezing the guy the first time around."

Alexander stiffens. "Which the bugs picked up," he says. "Because they were planted before you guys got there."

"Shit," JT says. He can feel his eyes go wide. "They caught that?"

"I mean," Alexander says. He picks the bug up off the table and closes it gently in his fist. The orange glow that had been encapsulating the bug spreads quickly to cover his arm, then his whole body, and his eyes start glowing bright orange. It's incredibly disconcerting; JT's seen it a grand total of once since leaving Michigan, and it hadn't been any less weird then.

"Uh," Tyson says under his breath.

"It's normal, let him talk to the electronics," Eichs says. "Also, if you can, take him in a room with a fuckton of computers. He starts humming. It's hilarious."

Zach snorts. "He also goes into withdrawal when he leaves."

"Oh man," Tyson says, laughing a little. "What does brain wifi withdrawal even look like?"

"Brain wifi," Morgan echoes. "How the hell did we never think of that? Applesauce, you're extra hired. I love it."

"Sweet," Tyson says, grinning at the comm button. "What's the job description? I'm good at jokes and hockey, so if it's much more than that, I'm probably out."

JT opens his mouth, probably to say something mortifying about Tyson being good at plenty of other things, but thankfully Alexander zones back in before he does more than draw a breath. "I have an address," he says, glancing around. He's always extra freaky right after he stops doing his thing; the glow on his body snaps instantly, but it takes longer to fade out of his eyes. "The good news is that I know where it is."

"What's the bad news?" Eichs asks.

"I mean, that's sort of also the bad news," Alexander says. "The only part of Michigan I'm familiar with is the part of Ann Arbor that we used to operate out of."

Morgan's mouth twists. "So it's someone on Super Row," she says. "That's just great."

"About a block to the north, actually," Alexander says quietly.

JT goes absolutely still as the whole team falls silent. Tyson glances around the room questioningly, but his gaze settles on JT.

"Is it," Zach asks, and his voice sounds pained, haunted. "Is it there, Keeper? Right there?"

Alexander nods. "I checked on three different map sites," he says, hunching over and staring at his hands. "It's there."

"Okay, new guy question here," Tyson says, tone cautious. "I'm getting that it's somewhere significant, but I don't know the backstory here, so I'm not catching on."

"Super Row is in the northwest part of town," Eichs says. "About a block south of Barton Pond, which is…"

"It's where we had our last fight," Morgan fills in. "That's where Blink died."

-0-

Eichs more or less shuts down, so Morgan calls the meeting not long after that. Zach leaves about half an hour later, and then it's JT, Tyson, and Alexander in the living room, so much like old times and so _very_ much different at the same time.

"I think," Alexander says. "I think we need to tell Tys about Blink, JT."

JT swallows hard. "I know."

"And I think you need to tell part of it," Alexander goes on. His voice is gentle, and JT wants to _throw_ something, but—

"I know," he says again, closing his eyes. "You start. I'll jump in."

He can hear Alexander sigh, and the sofa shifts as someone settles next to him. He opens his eyes back up to see Tyson giving him a concerned look. "You don't have to tell me," he says, glancing in Alexander's direction before looking back at JT. "If it's that awful for you…"

"No, we do," JT says. "Some dude saying Blink's name when he's talking to me, that's one thing. It's a big thing, but it's isolated. That footage being sent to Barton Pond…"

"It's connected," Alexander finishes. "There's no such thing as coincidence."

Tyson sighs. "Okay."

"Okay," Alexander echoes. "So Blink was our last team member. She could… it was basically like teleporting. All she had to do was picture a place, and…" He snaps his fingers. "There in a blink."

"Whoa," Tyson says. "That's awesome."

"It was," Alexander agrees. "She was good at it, too. Most people with teleportation can only transport themselves, but she could do anything. Things, people, whatever—if she could touch it, she could take it."

"It wasn't actually teleportation," JT says. He's staring at the floor, but he's thinking about it, about Blink sketching it out with her hands and trying to get the rest of them to wrap their heads around it, laughing when none of them even came close. "We never figured out a good way to describe it, but it was like… she could _go_ somewhere, and then move in that place, and then come back to the real world, and it would only take a split second of our time."

"Which isn't how normal teleportation works," Tyson says. "Gotcha."

Alexander sighs. "It's really not, no. She was… she could leave stuff there, wherever it was, and she could go back for it later, and it was always right where she left it."

"That is insanely cool," Tyson says. "Like, no offense to what the rest of you can do, but that's what I would want."

"It's what everyone wants," JT says, "And she got the super amped-up version of it. She was incredible."

"She was," Alexander agrees. "Buttercup was our heavy, but Blink was our secret weapon. All he had to do was clear a path for her to get to whatever the goal was, and it was ours."

"You guys would've made a kickass heist team," Tyson says. "Just saying."

JT snorts. "Too bad all those pesky morals and ethics got in the way."

"It's a shame," Tyson agrees with a smile.

There's silence for a moment before Alexander sighs. "We got wind of something going down," he says. "A raid. We didn't know what the raid was _for_, but we had a time and a date and a location. I was back in what was more or less our headquarters, because I don't have any physical abilities. I'm most useful when I'm plugged in, so I was."

"The rest of us went up to the lake," JT says. The rest of the story is going to fall to him, he knows, so he swallows hard and takes a deep breath. "Section and I usually stuck together, and Buttercup and Bounce paired up. They drew the aggro, and we were there to help from more of a distance. Blink was wherever she needed to be, more or less."

"We all had field comms," Alexander adds. "I kept those running, and if they needed something—information, or a sudden green light, or a power outage—I did it from base."

"We were all looking around, trying to figure out where the fight was," JT says. His hands are in fists. "And then the fight was just—everywhere, all at once. There had to be two dozen rogue supers attacking from every direction. Everything just kept happening, and it was all we could do to keep track of ourselves."

Sometimes JT wishes his memory wasn't so good. Or, like, he wishes he could use it to just remember the good things—the playoff wins, the sick goals, memories of the life he wants to have, instead of the ones he can't get rid of no matter how much of a cold sweat he wakes up in some nights.

"It wasn't weird for Blink to not be where we could see her," he says after a moment. "She was—she could be anywhere, and then anywhere else. It's why it took us so long to notice."

"Notice," Tyson says slowly.

"She wasn't anywhere," JT says. "Section and I thought she was with Bounce and Buttercup, and they thought she was back up with us. Keeper had alarms on our comms, so if we went out of range they'd beep at him."

"Except hers was different," Alexander says. "Because she went out of range all the time, right? Her whole power was out of range, and the constant beeping annoyed me, so I just made hers kind of a soft buzz."

"And as we were wrapping things up," JT says. His fingers hurt from how hard he's clenching them. "She buzzed."

"She buzzed," Alexander echoes, and it's like the grief hits JT all over again.

"She was just—in midair, maybe a hundred feet up," JT says. "Falling. And we all thought she'd blink out, that she'd land herself on a rooftop, but she fell and she fell, and—"

JT's gaze jerks up when Tyson touches his hand, and his face is twisted with emotion. "She didn't blink," Tyson says softly.

"She didn't blink," JT says hoarsely. "And Section didn't bubble her, and I didn't freeze her, and she—"

"Jesus," Tyson whispers.

Alexander laughs raggedly. "Pretty sure Jesus had nothing to do with what happened there."

"And you watched," Tyson says, voice tinged with horror. "The whole thing."

"I watch it in living colour about twice a month," JT says. His chest hurts, aches with all the emotion he rarely lets himself feel. "In case you were wondering why I'm sometimes even less of a morning person than normal."

Tyson stares at him, and then he tips forward, arms reaching around to tug JT in. It's an awkward hug, but JT closes his eyes and slumps against Tyson's chest.

"So that's why it's kind of fucked up that the guy said that Blink said hi," Alexander says after a moment. "And the bug traces back to the storefront where she—landed."

Tyson makes an awful noise deep in his chest, and JT feels it as much as he hears it. "What the fuck."

"I don't know," JT says, voice barely above a whisper. "But I'm damn well going to find out."

-0-

Alexander gives JT a _look_ when he explains the sleeping situation, but he doesn't comment. JT knows better than to think he's not going to get some kind of talking-to about it eventually, but he doesn't have the energy for it tonight and he's pretty sure Alexander doesn't, either.

By the time he wakes up, JT's pretty sure that Tyson has a secret power, and it's keeping bad dreams at bay. JT remembers hazy bits and pieces, but he hadn't woken up gasping for air, croaking out Blink's name and picturing himself running towards her crumpled form on the pavement, so he's calling it an absolute success of a night, honestly.

"Hey," Tyson says quietly as JT blinks his eyes open. "Morning."

"Morning," JT says, turning his head to face Tyson. "How long've you been up?"

"A little while," Tyson says vaguely. "I figured you needed the sleep, and when I tried to move, you made noises like you were waking up, so I stayed."

JT makes a face. “Sorry."

"It's fine," Tyson says with a smile.

"Okay," JT says. He rolls his shoulders a little; he needs to crack his back, but he doesn't want to get up yet, to get out of this quiet, warm bubble he and Tyson are in. "You sleep okay?"

Tyson's still smiling at him. "Yeah. You?"

"Better than I thought I would," JT admits.

Tyson's arm is still across JT's chest, which JT discovers when Tyson side-hugs him. "Good," he says. "We have, like, half an hour before the alarm's gonna go off, if you want to go back to sleep."

"No, I," JT says. He stops himself, mostly because he's not sure what was going to come out of his mouth next.

Tyson laughs quietly. "You what?"

JT leans across the space between them and presses his lips to Tyson's.

There's a single frozen moment where JT thinks _shit, why the hell did I do that_, but Tyson makes a tiny sound and slides his hand up JT's chest to cup his jaw. He kisses back for a moment, soft and easy, and it's quiet enough in the bedroom for JT to hear the sheets rustle when Tyson pulls away.

"Hey," Tyson murmurs. "Open your eyes?"

JT blinks his eyes open, and for the life of him, he has no idea when he closed them. "Hi."

"Hi," Tyson says, and his smile this time is brilliant. "Did you mean to do that, or…"

"Yeah," JT says. Meaning to and consciously deciding to are two different things. "I meant to."

"Oh, good," Tyson says. His hand is warm against JT's face. "It's not just, like. Proximity, or whatever?"

"I mean, that's why it happened now instead of yesterday," JT says, lifting a shoulder. "But it's not new, if that's what you're asking."

"That's what I'm asking," Tyson confirms. "And it's something you want to do again?"

"Oh my god, I'm into you," JT says, exasperated. "I like you, I want to kiss you again, I want to take you out for dinner, I want—"

This time Tyson's the one to lean in, laughing as he kisses JT. It's a mess of a kiss, JT struggling to keep his smile in check while Tyson keeps breaking off to laugh, but it's good. It's memorable, and it somehow fits them easily, like it's already warm and comfortable and lived-in. It's something JT can't wait to get used to, if he's being honest with himself here.

Tyson pulls back far too soon for JT's liking, but then again, he'd probably feel that way no matter how long they were at it. "Same," he says, leaning his forehead against JT's. "In case that wasn't clear."

"Uh," JT asks, blinking. "What?"

Tyson laughs and kisses him again, sweet and short. "I'm into you," he says. "Everything you said about kissing and dinner dates and whatever else? Same."

"Same," JT echoes. "I manage to use my words, and all you can come up with is 'same?'"

"You used all the good ones already," Tyson replies, grinning at him. "Look, the alarm's gonna go off any minute. I just want to make sure we're on the same page before we get up and the moment passes or whatever. No part of me wants to wonder all day about if you actually want me or not because we didn't talk about it, okay?"

"I do," JT says. He reaches out beneath the blankets and rests his hand on Tyson's hip. "Want you, I mean."

"Go out with me," Tyson says. "I'll make reservations. We'll go somewhere nice."

"Yeah," JT says, smiling a little helplessly. "You gonna treat me nice?"

Tyson's grin goes a little dirty. "Is that what you're into?"

JT's startled into a laugh. "You're gonna have to wait and see on that one," he says, squeezing Tyson's hip. "That's not pre-date knowledge."

"Really?" Tyson asks. "Because I'm happy to let you know about—"

JT laughs again as he leans in to kiss him quiet, and yeah, he _really_ wants to get used to this.

-0-

"Hey, JT," Alexander says quietly. He's standing in the entryway, shoes and coat on, and his face is unusually serious. He glances towards the living room, where Tyson is busy messing around with the brand-new comm button that Alexander had presented to him after breakfast.

"Yeah?" JT asks.

Alexander sighs and meets JT's eyes. "You need to talk, you and Josty," he says. "I know you have your issues with relationships after everything with Hyms—"

JT snorts. "Let me stop you before you hurt yourself," he says dryly. "We talked."

"You," Alexander says, blinking. "What? When?"

"This morning," JT says. "So no, you didn't miss anything last night, but also, no, we don't need to have that discussion. We talked."

"And given the lack of horrifically awkward silences during breakfast, I'm guessing it went well," Alexander says. When JT nods, he smiles. "Good. I'm glad."

"Me too," JT says, and he knows his smile is probably super telling when he glances over at Tyson, but oh well. It's just going to be his life for a little while, probably.

"You guys are doing well," Alexander says softly, and JT turns back to see him smiling kind of sadly. "Everyone, I mean. I fucking miss it here."

JT reaches out almost on autopilot, yanking Alexander into a hug. "It's fucking weird, you not being here," he mutters into Alexander's hair. "I kept looking for you on the ice to tell you stupid shit about the new kids."

"Are we group hugging?" Tyson asks. JT looks over, and he's watching them from the sofa, a strained sort of smile on his face. "If we're not, can we be?"

Alexander laughs. "Yeah, get over here," he says, holding an arm out, and then JT has his arms full of his favourite people in the world, more or less. There's a lot of bullshit going pear-shaped in his life right now, but at least he's got this, a morning that let him pretend for a few hours that everything was normal.

"We should make plans for the All-Star break," Tyson says. "The three of us. We can go somewhere nice and warm."

Alexander snorts. "I want no part of your honeymoon," he says, laughing when Tyson makes an offended noise. "We'll FaceTime more, okay? And you've got a comm button and a great code name now, Applesauce, so we're pretty much in constant contact."

"Applesauce," Tyson repeats, grinning and rolling his eyes at the same time. "Way to throw me under the bus there, by the way."

"Like you want to throw those apples with your brain," JT says, nodding. He grins when Tyson laughs again.

"That's such a specific thing to want," Alexander says.

"That is exactly what JT said," Tyson says with a laugh. "Whatever, man. It would be a super unexpected power. Like Bounce, but apples."

"Oh my god," Alexander says, laughing. "Okay, we definitely need to put that idea into her head."

"She can sort of control the shapes if she concentrates hard enough," JT supplies. "We can make this happen."

"Awesome," Tyson says with a grin. He squeezes them both tightly for a second before sighing. "You probably have to go, huh?"

"Yeah," Alexander says, stepping back. "I'll catch you guys later, okay? And we'll be in touch about everything that's going on."

"Good luck with the rest of your season," Tyson says, letting go of JT to hug Alexander tightly for a second. He grins. "But, like, fuck you guys tonight."

"Yeah, that," JT says, stepping in when Tyson lets go of Alexander. "Tell Zach... tell him I said thanks. For the talk."

"Tell him your damn self," Alexander grumbles, but he tightens his arms around JT's waist before drawing back. "I didn't want to be your messenger when you guys hadn't fixed your shit, and I sure as hell don't want to do it now that you're finally sort of talking again."

JT snorts. "Thanks," he says, making himself let go and step back when Alexander loosens his hold. "It was good to see you, Kerf."

"It was good to visit," Alexander says, smiling. He glances around, then nods. "Later."

Tyson reaches out and grabs JT's hand as Alexander opens the door and walks out into the hallway. They stand there hand-in-hand until the door clicks shut, and then Tyson sighs. "Well," he says, "this fucking sucks."

"Yeah," JT says. Tyson's always been special to him, but he and Alexander have known each other for almost a decade at this point, and once JT got over hating every single reference to his past, Alexander went from painful reminder to best friend almost overnight. JT misses him like a phantom limb three times a week on average.

Tyson folds into him, and JT's arms come up without input from the rest of him. They sway together in the doorway for a moment before Tyson sighs and mumbles something against JT's shoulder.

"Hm?" JT asks. "I didn't catch that."

"I hate that he got traded," Tyson says, barely any louder. "But fuck, I'm so glad it wasn't you."

JT inhales sharply and hugs Tyson tighter. "Me too," he says. "I hope—"

"So do I," Tyson cuts in. "Don't say it. I'm too superstitious for that."

It makes JT laugh quietly, which was the point, if the way Tyson smiles against JT's shoulder is any indication. JT closes his eyes and inhales deeply, spreading his fingers over Tyson's back and just… standing there. It's something he never really took the time to do before everything with Blink, and something that he hasn't really had reason to do since, to just take notice of things, purposely making a memory that he can call back up later. He'd thought that he'd have time, but he's older now and at least a little bit wiser. Sometimes there isn't time.

"Well," JT says quietly, "we're both here now."

"We are," Tyson agrees, and JT has the feeling that Tyson's doing something similar. "We are."

-0-

There's a message on JT's phone when he leaves practice. It's right before Thanksgiving, and he's honestly ready for the mini-break. He's tempted to leave whatever the message is for later, but the area code is local, so he calls back on the off-chance it's important.

"Mr. Compher," the voice says. "This is Detective Eileen Silvestra with the Denver Police. I wanted to follow up with you about the burglary at your home at the end of last month. Please give me a call." There's a phone number, and JT replays the message so he can write it down.

"Hey," Tyson says, and JT looks up. He's holding his phone and frowning. "Any chance you got a message from a Detective Silvestra?"

"Sure did," JT says. He glances around; the locker room is pretty much empty other than them, but he lowers his voice anyway. "Don't call back yet. Let's check with Keeper to make sure there's nothing weird about Silvestra before we give them any info."

Tyson's eyes widen slightly. "Right," he says, glancing around. "We'll, uh. You have to see the trainers, right?"

JT frowns. "I mean, I don't _have_ to. My shoulder's fine; it's just a little tense."

"Okay, rephrasing," Tyson says, raising both eyebrows. "You're going to go see the trainers, because I don't want to hear you bitching about your shoulder later, and I'm gonna find a quiet place and call Keeper."

JT frowns. "You can't just—you need, uh. Your other phone."

Tyson snorts. "If you think I don't have it on me at all times, babe, think again."

"Of course you do," JT says, rolling his eyes when Tyson pats his pocket. "Okay, okay. I'll get them to look at my shoulder, and you let me know what Keeper says."

"Will do," Tyson says. He leans over to drop a kiss to JT's forehead, then walks out of the locker room.

"Uh," JT hears, and he whips his head around to see Gabe looking at him, eyes wide. "So that's… happening?"

JT raises his eyebrows. "Surprise."

"No, it's cool, that's great," Gabe says, and his voice is so earnest that JT sort of wants to laugh. "I don't think anyone's going to give you shit, but if they do, let me know. I'll absolutely have your back, and so will EJ and Nate."

"Did you guys have some sort of leadership team meeting about what you'd do if one of the guys came out?" JT asks, raising an eyebrow.

Gabe colours. "Maybe."

It makes JT laugh. "Okay, well, thanks," he says, standing. "We, uh, haven't really talked about telling anyone yet, so…"

"No, totally," Gabe says hastily. "Mouth shut, I got it." He hesitates. "Nobody else knows?"

"Kerfy knows," JT says. "It sort of happened while he was in town last week."

"Oh my god," Gabe says, laughing. "Tell me he had something to do with it."

"He didn't, but he only missed his chance by about two hours," JT says, smiling reluctantly. "Look, I need to see the trainers about my shoulder. Thanks for the support, and I'll let you know if anyone's terrible, okay?"

"Okay," Gabe says, smiling back. "Let me know if you need anything for your shoulder, too."

"I have a boyfriend to help me with that shit now," JT says, and he smiles wider when Gabe laughs.

The trainers poke at his shoulder and tell him to rest and ice it, which he could've figured out on his own, but at least this way he can tell Tyson that he had a professional look at it. He listens to the usual spiel about coming back if it gets worse, and then he makes his escape.

Tyson's in the locker room, playing a game on his phone, and he looks up when JT walks in. "Hey," he says, smiling. "Keeper's looking into it and says he'll get back to us later today. How's the shoulder?"

"Fine, ice and rest," JT says. "Also, Gabe was in the locker room before, and he, uh. Saw when you left."

"Well," Tyson says after a moment. "At least it wasn't EJ?"

"I got a very nice speech about how we should go to him or EJ or Nate if anyone gives us shit, actually," JT says, amused. "But the cat's out of the bag, I guess."

Tyson laughs. "Oh well."

"That's more or less what I was thinking," JT says. He reaches his hand out, and Tyson takes it and pulls himself up. He's right there, so JT presses a quick kiss to his mouth. "Home?"

"Yeah," Tyson says. He drops JT's hand to turn and grab his things, so JT walks past him to grab his stuff, too. "Any idea what the detective is calling about?"

"Hopefully to say the police have somehow solved this whole thing," JT says. "I mean, I'm not counting on it, but that's what I _hope_."

"That'd be nice," Tyson agrees, grinning as they start heading for the car. "I'm hoping for some kind of explanation on how they're handling having fake twins in the same jail at the same time."

"Yeah, I bet that's a circus," JT says, laughing as they exit the building. "I can't even imagine. What a nightmare."

"Better them than us," Tyson agrees. "Hopefully that guy's only power is looking like other people and he doesn't have, like, secret additional super strength."

"It doesn't really work that way," JT says, shrugging. "I mean, in super rare cases it does, but even Denverite only has flying and super strength. It's why superhero movies are so unrealistic, honestly. Superman can fly _and_ shoot lasers out of his eyes _and_ he's super strong _and_..."

"Yeah, but they're fun," Tyson points out as they reach the car. "Also, if they were true to life, they'd be documentaries. Or shows like _Cops_."

JT wrinkles his nose. "Yeah, no thanks," he says. "_Supers_ sounds like a terrible show."

"Can't be worse than _Cops_," Tyson reasons, and JT has to laugh in agreement.

-0-

Alexander gives them the okay to talk to Silvestra, so JT and Tyson call her back and set a time to meet with her on an off day. Tyson's the one who brings up not revealing everything they know and JT agrees quickly; he for sure doesn't want to dredge up his whole past again so soon, so they both decide to play a little dumb.

Silvestra meets them in the lobby, and JT doesn't know what he was expecting, but she's definitely not it. She's taller than both of them, and she reminds JT of his second-grade teacher in a way he can't quite pinpoint. He kind of likes her right off the bat; she looks like she could hold her own in a fight, and that was always his favourite thing about Mrs. Corella.

"So," she begins as they settle into the interview room. She's got a blank notepad and a pencil in front of her, and she picks the pencil up and starts tapping the eraser against the paper. "You're neighbours, and you were both present at both break-ins, correct?"

"Yeah," Tyson says. "We're, uh. Friends. Teammates, too."

"We play for the Avs," JT adds when Silvestra just keeps looking at them. "The Denver pro hockey team?"

"Right, okay," Silvestra says. "That clears up the confusion." She gives them a quick grin. "It was just odd, both of you being present both times, and there's enough odd going on here that we wanted to check on that."

"Odd," JT repeats cautiously.

"Because it was the same guy both times?" Tyson asks. "Because we thought that was pretty freaking weird."

Silvestra sighs and sets her pencil down. "Look, I'll be honest with you," she says. "When you called in the second break-in, we scrambled around, trying to figure out how the burglar got out without us noticing, but the truth is, he didn't."

"I don't want to, like, call you a liar or anything," Tyson says, frowning. Maybe his secret power is lying, JT thinks, a little awed at how well he's keeping things hidden. "But it was for sure him."

"I can assure you, Mr. Jost, it wasn't," Silvestra says. "Are either of you familiar with the power of transformation?"

"Like Mystique," Tyson says instantly. He pauses and frowns again. "Wait, so the second guy copied the first guy?"

"Yes," Silvestra says. "And, I'm sorry to say, we've since lost track of the second would-be burglar."

JT feels his eyes go wide, and he's not faking the shock. "You _what_?"

Silvestra sighs. "He can take anyone's form," she says. "One of our night guards thought that one of the day guards got trapped in a cell and let him out, and by the time the mistake was caught, he was long gone."

JT feels a little sick. "So some rogue super who brought a gun to Tyson's apartment tricked his way out of jail, and you didn't think that maybe that's information we'd want to know?"

"We've had plainclothes officers in and around your building 24/7 since we found out," Silvestra says calmly. "You haven't been in any danger."

"He can look like anybody," Tyson says, and JT would bet his next game's paycheck that the anger in his voice isn't faked at all. "How can you know that he didn't, like, transform into a pizza delivery guy and sneak in?"

"We have ways of checking to see if there's super activity going on in a certain area," she replies. "We set up nets on your building's entryways. They haven't pinged once."

"Jesus," Tyson mutters. He slumps back into his seat and slightly into JT's side. "So that crazy freak is out there somewhere and nobody has a single clue where, or why he broke into my place, or who he actually is."

"Well," Silvestra says. She picks her pencil back up. "Not exactly."

JT feels Tyson tense beside him. "What do you mean, 'not exactly?'" JT asks, trying to will Tyson to stay calm.

"We reviewed the footage from his cell," Silvestra says. "As it turns out, he didn't shift directly from the form of the original burglar to the form of our guard. There was a form in between, and our resident super expert says that it's common for transformers to have to shift back to their actual forms before shifting again."

"So you have footage of his actual face," Tyson says. "Can we see?"

Silvestra pulls a photo from between the pages of her notepad. "Do you recognise him?" she asks, pushing the photo across the table.

JT frowns at it. The man is short, with close-cut blond hair and dark eyes. "No," he says, shaking his head. "I don't know who that is at all."

"I don't either," Tyson says. He glances at JT like he's asking something, but JT has no idea what. Tyson turns back to Silvestra after a moment. "Can we take it? Maybe our teammates will know, or maybe the Avs will know about a crazy fan who's mad that we lost in the playoffs last year or something."

Silvestra hesitates, then nods. "I'll contact your team representatives myself," she says. "That's an angle I hadn't considered, but it's worth checking out. If any of your teammates know who that man is, give me a call." She reaches into the pocket of her jacket and pulls out a business card. "That's my work phone, so call day or night. We badly want to figure out what's going on here, gentlemen, and we're sorry about the way the investigation has unfolded so far."

"Do me a favour, and if the first guy gets out, let us know," JT says. "Just, like. That's information we would really, really like to have."

"We will," Silvestra promises, standing. She offers her hand when they stand, too, and she has a strong handshake. "I'll call you myself if we apprehend the second burglar, and if the first one does anything that might compromise your safety, I'll be sure you're kept in the loop."

"Thanks," Tyson says. "That's… thanks."

"Yeah," JT echoes as Silvestra shows them out. "Thanks."

-0-

"Can you even fucking believe," Tyson starts as they get in the car.

"I can," JT says curtly. "There's a reason supers don't usually work hand in hand with the police. There's a lot of bullshit that happens in police departments, and this isn't even close to the worst thing I've seen."

"I don't think I want that story," Tyson says after a moment.

"You don't," JT says, starting the car and pulling out of his parking space. "Comm that photo to Keeper, see if he can run it and get anything off of it."

"Yeah, on it," Tyson says. He pulls his comm button out of his pocket, and JT takes a breath to calm himself down as he drives home.

The comm button beeps again about halfway there; Tyson accesses his mailbox pretty quickly for a guy who's only had a comm button for a week, and JT grins to himself. "It's Keeper," Tyson says. "Video message."

"Go ahead and play it," JT says. "I'll listen in."

Alexander's voice starts a moment later. "No results," he says, and he sounds frustrated. "I'm going to keep looking, but he's not in any of the databases I have access to, police or FBI or Interpol or super. He's nowhere, but I'm not giving up yet."

"He has access to all of that?" Tyson asks as the video cuts out. "_How_?"

"All he has to do is flutter his eyelashes at a computer and he's got access," JT says, shrugging. "Just because he _has_ access doesn't mean someone thought he _should_ have that access. It's just his power."

Tyson hums. "Okay, I might like that better than Blink's power, actually," he says. "Free Netflix any time I wanted it? Hell yeah."

JT snorts. "Yeah, because paying for Netflix is a problem for any of us."

"It's the principle," Tyson says with a laugh. "I bet he can get new seasons of _Stranger Things_ before anyone else."

"Okay, point," JT says, grinning. "Hey, so. I have a thought."

"Okay," Tyson says easily. "Hit me with it."

"So you asked if I knew Denverite," JT says. "The answer's still no, but I _do_ know how to contact him. I'm thinking we get in touch with him, see if it's a local rogue super he knows about?"

"When you say 'we,'" Tyson says, and when JT glances over, he's grinning widely. "Am I gonna get to meet Denverite?"

"Assuming he answers the call, yeah," JT says, laughing. "There's a... think of it as a super communication thing, but less complex than the one Keeper set up. I can put up a flare, more or less, and anyone who sees it can answer it, but Denverite's the only person in the area."

"So unless he's a bag of dicks in real life, he'll answer the call," Tyson says, nodding. "Sounds good. How do we do it?"

JT sighs. "It's an internet forum," he says. "I have a login and whatever. It's super old-school and kind of embarrassing, honestly."

"An internet forum," Tyson says, clearly delighted. "Oh my god."

"Yeah," JT agrees, and he can't hide his grin. "Hiding in plain sight is a huge thing with a lot of supers. It works."

"I mean, I never would have guessed that you guys would have a big internet forum, so props to that," Tyson says. "Good job. How do you keep normal people out?"

"Everyone who joins has to be verified by someone else already in the forum," JT says. "It's the best we've got, and Keeper can basically track new applicants' computers back and see if they're legit or not. We haven't had any major issues, and I think it's as foolproof as it can get."

"Nice,” Tyson says as JT makes the turn into their parking lot. "How long does it take?"

"Not long, usually," JT says. "It's not as big a community as you'd think it is, and everyone in it is pretty active."

"So you post in this forum, we set up a time to meet with Denverite, and then we see if he knows our dude," Tyson says, nodding. "Seems legit."

"It's the best idea I have," JT says as he parks the car. "Also, if there's a super crime, it's kind of common courtesy to tell the local supers about it. He might actually be pissed that I haven't told him until now."

"Oh," Tyson says. He's frowning when JT looks over at him. "Well, I hope he's not too mad. We need his help."

"Yeah," JT says. "Hopefully he can get over it. Maybe we can offer him tickets if he seems super pissed."

"Yeah, that's a solid backup plan," Tyson says, laughing. "Hopefully he's just not a dick."

"Fingers crossed," JT says. "C'mon, let's go upstairs so we can try it out."

It's remarkably easy to do, JT discovers when he gets upstairs. He doesn't have any trouble logging into the system, and posts his message for Denverite without an issue.

"Now we wait, I guess," he says, sitting back. "I don't know how long it's gonna take him to—"

JT's phone pings softly with a reply from Denverite.

Tyson snickers. "Not long," he says. "That's kind of cool."

_An hour_, the message reads. _Meet me on top of the FSC_.

"Weird," Tyson says, reading over JT's shoulder. "Well, okay. I guess we're going to the practice rink."

"At least it's close," JT says, frowning. "And at least we know that the acronym is for the practice facility. That could be really difficult if it wasn't."

"Well, luck's on our side," Tyson says. He stands from the sofa. "Let's get over there. It'll probably take some time to get up to the roof without getting caught, and we only have an hour."

"Yeah, sure," JT says, following Tyson as he walks out of the apartment. 

The drive to the practice facility is short at this time of night, so it's a matter of maybe ten minutes before they get there. It takes them a while to find a ladder to the roof; JT's glad they're both athletes, because they have to jump to reach it, but they're up there with about fifteen minutes to spare when all is said and done.

"Not bad," someone says, and JT spins around and sees Denverite hovering a few inches off the rooftop in all his ungodly orange glory. "I didn't know if you guys would find the ladder that fast."

JT scowls. "We're not idiots," he says.

"No, man, I know," Denverite says, finally touching down. "You guys should know I don't think that."

JT turns to Tyson, but nope, he looks just as confused as JT feels. "Uh," Tyson says. "Not that we're not glad or whatever, but why would you think we should know that?"

Denverite stares at them for a minute. "You're pulling my leg," he finally says. "Did you really ping me without having a clue?"

"We pinged you because I need your help," JT begins.

"Yeah, Ticker, I fucking know that," Denverite says, tone going a little annoyed. "Did you seriously—you know what, fine." He reaches up and takes his mask off, and—

"Oh, you have _got_ to be fucking _kidding me_," Tyson says, and honestly? JT could not agree more.

-0-

"So," JT starts. They're back at his apartment, all three of them.

"So," EJ repeats, staring back at him. The orange suit has looked ridiculous in every single photo JT has ever seen, but it's somehow a lot worse in the bright light of his apartment. It's probably because he's sitting on a blue sofa, JT thinks sort of faintly. The contrast is... a lot.

"So you're Denverite," Tyson says. Maybe his power is stating the blatantly obvious.

"And you never said anything," JT adds.

EJ spreads his hands in front of himself. "I thought you knew!"

"How would we have known?" JT asks. "Seriously, the whole time Kerfy was here, we thought we were the only ones, and now you're telling me that you're a super and you have been this whole time? _And_ you knew I was Ticker?"

"And Kerfy's Keeper, yeah," EJ says. "You seriously didn't know?"

"How did _you_ know?" Tyson asks.

"Because—" EJ's face does something complicated. "Oh. Right."

JT glances at Tyson, whose eyebrows are raised so high it's probably hurting his facial muscles. "What?"

"Uh," EJ says. "Nate told me?"

"More words," JT says. "How the fuck did Nate know?"

"Nate might possibly also have a power," EJ says. "Theoretically."

"Oh my god," Tyson says. "What can he do, read minds?"

EJ doesn't say anything, and JT's eyes go wide. "You're fucking with me."

"It's not, like, a thing," EJ says hastily. "He just—when we get new guys in the room, he takes a quick glance around to see if there's anything we should be on the lookout for, but he doesn't actually deep dive into anyone's head. He's just looking for a kid missing home, or a guy who isn't sure he's gonna fit in, that kind of thing. Stuff that it might be nice to have a teammate to talk to about, y'know?" He looks uncomfortable. "When you got here, you were kind of… yelling about how fucked up you were. Honestly, Kerfy wasn't much better."

JT blinks at him. "So that's why you adopted me," he says.

"Yeah," EJ says, shrugging. "You needed someone you could talk to, even if I was pretty sure you were never actually going to do it. And I tried to drop hints and stuff, but I guess I should've been clearer on that front."

"I mean," JT says, sighing and closing his eyes. "I wouldn't have taken it well, I don't think. Not at first. I was trying to leave all that shit behind me."

"That's what Nate said," EJ says. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry about your teammate."

"Blink," Tyson says. "C'mon, man, use her name."

"Amanda," JT says quietly. "Her name was Amanda."

Tyson reaches out and puts a hand on JT's knee. "Amanda," he repeats. "Thanks for telling us."

"Wait, wait," EJ says, and they turn to look back at him. "Fucking—Amanda _Kessel_?"

JT flinches. "Yeah."

"Kessel," Tyson says. "Like Phil? That kind of Kessel?"

"Yeah," JT repeats. "His sister. She was… she wanted to play in that new women's league on the east coast. I've never skated with a better hockey player."

"Holy shit," EJ says, voice kind of blank. "I know Phil from Team USA shit. I thought his sister just retired or something."

JT gives him a weak smile. "Now you know why he lost his cool and flattened ten square acres outside of Toronto, though."

"Shit," EJ repeats. "And the media said it was proof he couldn't handle the stress of playing in Toronto."

"If that reporter says a single word about Kerf or Brutes, I hope you know I'm going to punch him in his stupid smug face," Tyson says flatly.

"Yeah, seconded," JT says. He sighs. "So you're Denverite and Nate can read minds. Anything else I should know about?"

"I offered to kick anybody's ass for you," EJ protests. "I seriously thought you knew!"

"EJ, I have seen you take a dude down for looking sideways at Mikko during warmups," JT says. "I thought that's what you were talking about."

"I mean, also that," EJ says. "Although I guess that _does_ explain why you didn't just text me that you wanted to meet up."

"Are there any other supers on the team?" Tyson asks. "You, Nate, JT. Anyone else, or are we just gonna have to trip over them as we find them?"

EJ studies Tyson's face. "You?" he guesses.

"Nope, I'm just Applesauce," Tyson shoots back. "I get if you don't want to give away anyone's secrets, man, but—"

"That's it," EJ cuts in. "Applesauce? What the fuck?"

Tyson huffs. "I don't know if you need to know that info."

"He's the new coordinator for what's left of my team," JT says. It's not quite true, but it's also not exactly a lie. "Which disbanded after everything went down, but is now back together, because there's some bullshit happening."

"Oh, I love bullshit," EJ says, leaning in slightly. "Tell me all about it."

JT snorts, but it's incredibly on brand for EJ. He lays out the story as well as he can—the burglaries, the same-but-different burglar, the team's discussions, the news from Silvestra. "We wanted to know if you knew of a local rogue super," he concludes. "Tys has the photo."

"Yeah, here," Tyson says, grabbing the photo from the end table and handing it over. "We don't know who he is, but we think that's his actual form."

"Hm," EJ says, eyes narrowing. "I don't have a clue, guys."

JT blows out a breath. "Well, shit."

"Hold on, though," EJ says. "Can I borrow this?"

"Take a photo," Tyson says. "I think we should hang onto the original."

"Sure, okay," EJ says, pulling out his phone. He snaps a quick photo, then looks back up at them. "I know someone who might be able to help."

"How?" JT asks.

EJ shifts. "One of the guys on the Broncos can tell anyone's name just by looking at them. I have no idea if it works on photos or not, but it's worth a try."

"Oh, that's kind of creepy," Tyson says, frowning a little. "I mean, yeah, give it a whirl, but that's kind of _yikes_ as a power."

"You don't get to pick," EJ says, shrugging.

"Jesse's power is getting plants to grow," JT volunteers. "Which could be crazy useful, except it only works on little plants. She was bummed when we couldn't figure out how to make it work so she could join the team with me and Morgan."

"I mean, she gets to have an awesome vegetable garden, though," Tyson points out. "I think I'd take that over 'creepy guy who just knows your name before you introduce yourself.'"

"He goes by Von, actually," EJ volunteers.

Tyson makes a strangled sound. "Von _Miller_?"

"Yup," EJ says cheerily. "Nice guy, really."

"Wow," JT says. He's not sure he should be as amused as he is, but here he finds himself anyway. "Well, let us know if you find anything out. We'll keep working on it on our end, and hopefully we can just get this whole thing sorted out soon."

"Yeah, hopefully," EJ says. "And hey, JT?"

"Yeah?"

"I will still kick absolutely anybody's ass if you need," EJ says firmly. "And I don't just mean on the ice."

JT smiles. "Yeah, EJ. Thanks."

-0-

Von Miller can't tell who the guy is through a photograph, and Alexander can't find a record of him no matter which database he tries. JT's pulling out his hair, wondering how they're going to figure it out, but the guy doesn't show his face, nor does he show up disguised as the Grubhub delivery guy and do his best to cause them serious damage. It's for the best that JT doesn't stress himself out over it, so he mostly tries to not think about it.

"Uh," Tyson says. He's sitting at the table in JT's kitchen, screwing around on his phone while JT cleans up from lunch. They're playing the Flyers tonight, and it's almost nap time. "Holy shit."

"What?" JT asks, walking over. Tyson sounds a little freaked out; even if this is serious enough to push nap time off, JT seriously doubts the lack of sleep will be enough to disrupt their game. It's the _Flyers_.

Tyson points at his phone. "I think I found our dude?"

"You what?" JT asks. He leans in to look at Tyson's phone, and sure enough, he's got a photo of the guy from the police photo there. He swipes through a few more, and it's the guy laughing, him with his arm around another guy, him asleep floating on a pool tube. The guy looks younger in all the photos, but it's definitely him. "How the fuck?"

"This is so dumb," Tyson says. "I can't believe it worked, holy shit."

"How did you find him?" JT asks. "Do we have a name?"

Tyson laughs a little incredulously. "I put it in my Facebook photos," he says, tapping at his phone. The photo minimizes, and JT's left staring at the profile for a Jared Lawler from Indianapolis. "The face algorithm thing found him."

"Oh my god, you're kidding me," JT says, blinking at Tyson's phone. "I'd say we can never tell Kerfy, but obviously we have to tell Kerfy immediately."

"Oh, yeah, for sure," Tyson says. "Button time?"

"Button time," JT confirms. He pulls his out of his pocket and calls Alexander; he's expecting it to go to voicemail, since the Leafs are playing tonight too, but the video screen resolves into Alexander's face.

"Hey," Alexander says. "How's it going?"

"Good, good," JT says. "How're you?"

"Good," Alexander says. "Kind of wondering why you're calling me when you're supposed to be napping, but y'know, everybody needs a hobby."

"Hypocrite," JT mutters.

"Oh, well, we just thought we'd let you know that we found our dude," Tyson says casually.

Alexander's eyes go wide and his jaw drops a little. "You _what_? How?"

"Facebook," Tyson says gleefully, holding his phone up so Alexander can see it. "You know when you put a photo of someone in and it suggests people to tag?"

"You cannot be serious," Alexander says. "You—holy shit, really?"

JT laughs. "You need to up your game, man," he says. "Does the name Jared Lawler ring any bells?"

"Not really," Alexander says. "But that doesn't mean much. Now that I have a name, I can run it through all the systems again and see what turns up. Hopefully we'll get more results this time."

"Yeah, fingers crossed," JT says. "We'll let the police know, but I have no idea how much help they're going to be. We haven't heard from them since we found out that he got out."

"Yeah, good luck with that," Alexander says, rolling his eyes. "I'll tell the rest of the team. Hopefully this is a step closer to figuring everything out."

Tyson laughs. "Yeah, hopefully," he says. "We'll tell Denverite, too. Maybe if he knows who to look out for, he'll be more able to help."

Alexander scowls, and JT can relate; he's pretty much over not knowing about Nate and EJ now, but Alexander is still kind of pissy about the whole thing. "Yeah, tell him."

"We should probably nap, unless there's something else we should catch up on," JT says. "Flyers."

Alexander sighs. "Senators," he says. "God, I somehow hate them even more than I used to."

"That's a talent, I think," Tyson says. "Congratulations, man! You're levelling up. Your new extra power is hating the Sens."

"If that was a real power, Toronto would rise up en masse and just sort of crush Ottawa into dust," Alexander says with a grin. "Go take a nap. Tell everyone I said hey."

"Talk to you later, man," Tyson says, reaching out to end the call.

"Facebook," JT mutters as the video screen shuts down. "Fucking _Facebook_. Kerfy's gonna lose his shit updating all of his scanning systems."

"Nah, we can tell him to just hack Facebook," Tyson says easily. "Why remake the wheel, right? Just use what's already there."

JT shakes his head. "Facebook is actually harder to hack than some of the government servers he's got his brain hooked up to," he says. "Apparently ever since that big hacking scandal a few years ago, it's super tough to get in without being noticed. It'll be easier if he _does_ reinvent the wheel in this case."

"Fucking _Facebook_," Tyson says with a sigh. "Whatever. We have our guy, Kerfy's gonna do his thing and hopefully magic us up some info we can work with, and we should nap before we beat the Flyers."

"Is that your power?" JT teases as Tyson stands up. "You know whether or not we're going to win a game?"

"Nah, that's just a pure Tyson Jost prediction there," Tyson says, grinning down at JT. "I can see the standings, and I feel like our chances are good."

"As long as we get a nap in, I agree with you," JT says, standing and pocketing his comm button. "Ready?"

Tyson hums. He leans into JT's space, tilting his face so he can press a kiss to JT's mouth. When he pulls back, there's a grin on his face. "I am now," he says, taking a step back. "How about you?"

JT laughs and heads down the hall towards the bedroom. "Yeah," he says. "I think we're good to go."

-0-

Tyson calls Silvestra on their way to the Pepsi Center to update her; she sounds surprised, but she thanks him for the new information. Tyson scowls as he hangs up the phone. "I don't know why we bothered," he mutters. "We're gonna solve this whole thing for her and she's gonna get the credit."

"Welcome to the glorious life of being a super," JT says dryly. "All the work, almost none of the credit. _Definitely_ none of the pay."

"That's so bogus," Tyson says. "There should be some sort of super fund. You guys need to get paid."

"Good luck with that," JT says, laughing as he pulls into their designated parking spot.

"I'm gonna work on it," Tyson says, getting out of the car. "That's so not fair."

"Like I said, good luck," JT replies as they head inside. "I don't think you can get it funded, and if you think supers are going to register their real identities somewhere just to get some cash, you're in for kind of a rude awakening."

"Oh, man," Tyson says, frowning. "That makes sense. I still think it sucks, but I guess you wouldn't want the whole world being able to know who you are."

"Yeah, there was a whole thing in superhero comics a while ago about why that's a bad idea," JT says. "They get a lot of crap wrong, but a lot of supers I know were pretty impressed with the way they handled it. A lot of shit went bad pretty immediately, and that's what everyone thinks will happen in real life if supers are forced to register."

"Yeah, never mind," Tyson says, sighing as they walk into the locker room.

JT thinks pointedly in Nate's direction as soon as he catches sight of him, and Nate drops his roll of stick tape, glaring when JT snickers.

"Nate knows about Lawler," JT says under his breath to Tyson. "Now we just need to tell EJ."

"Tell me what?" EJ asks, throwing his arm over JT"s shoulders. He lowers his voice. "Nate says you found the guy?"

"Tyson Facebooked him," JT says, and he can't help that he sounds a little proud.

EJ laughs incredulously. "Fucking—seriously? Facebook was the answer?"

"Facebook is never the answer," Colin calls from across the room.

"Yes, I know, it's the devil incarnate," EJ says loudly. He lowers his voice as he turns back to JT. "Who's our guy?"

"I'll send you a screenshot of his profile," Tyson says. "We already told everyone else. Keeper's working on it."

"Good, cool," EJ says, nodding. "I'll see if any of my people know anything. God, I want this guy behind bars."

"Yeah, me too," JT says. "I have a few questions for him first, though."

"I bet you do," EJ says. "Send me the name, and then let's get ready to kick some Flyer ass!" The last part is said loudly, and a few of the other guys in the room whoop and holler. EJ grins.

It's nice to be able to lose himself in the game for a while; JT skates his warmup and sits through the pre-game speech from Coach, and then he goes out to the bench for the game. The Flyers are better this year than they were last year, so he focuses on the game, watching the goalie to see if he can find any signs of weakness. Hockey's easy; hockey's always easy, even when it's hard, because he knows what he's doing and he knows he's good at it. It doesn't matter if they're facing the first-place team or the last-place team; JT's going to try his hardest either way, and hopefully he comes up with a win.

They score twice and then the Flyers get one back; JT hits the post as the first ends, and he's scowling all the way back to the locker room. He's ready to get back to it when they go back to the bench for the second, eyes flicking from the side of the ice where the Flyers are getting ready for the period and back over to the Avs' side. It's his normal thing to do before the period starts, so JT isn't sure what makes him stop and look closely into the crowd on the other side of the rink, but when he does, he sucks in a sharp breath.

Someone says something next to him, but JT's eyes are locked on Jared Lawler, wearing the face of the guy who had broken into JT's apartment. He notices JT staring and smiles slowly, never once breaking eye contact.

"Hey JT," Tyson says, and JT blinks but doesn't look away. Tyson puts his hand on JT's thigh and leans in. "Hey, c'mon. I see him, okay, and you freaked Nate out and he ran back to tell security. It's being handled, okay?"

"He's right there," JT says, fists clenched around his stick. "He's fucking _right there_, Tys."

"And security's going to get him and escort him out," Tyson says. "They already called the police."

JT inhales deeply, trying to get his bearings back. "He's a shapeshifter," he says, not taking his eyes off of Lawler. "I don't want to risk losing sight of him."

"Oh, fuck," Tyson says, leaning away. "That's—shit, he could be anyone."

"Shit, _shit_," JT says as Lawler glances towards the stairs, where security is starting to head towards him, and backs up away from the glass. "We're gonna lose him."

"No, fuck that," Tyson says. He stands up and throws himself over the boards, skating for all he's worth towards the penalty box. One of the officials blows his whistle immediately, but JT's over the boards a second later anyway, heading for the other box. He tries his best to keep his eyes on Lawler, but by the time he makes it across the ice and yanks the door of the box open, he can't find him anywhere. He glances over to Tyson, who's staring at him with a helpless look on his face.

Lawler's gone.

-0-

They win the game, with no help at all from JT, and he has the feeling that Tyson really isn't giving it his all, either. Lawler had been here, and he'd made sure they saw him, and JT doesn't understand _why_.

"Hey," Nate says, sidling up to JT in the locker room after they're all showered and mostly changed. "You and Josty should come to my place. We can hang out, catch up a little." He glances across the locker room. "I invited EJ, too."

It's a super thing, then. JT nods. "We'll be there," he says. "Want us to head right over?"

"Yeah," Nate says, clapping JT on the shoulder. "See you in a bit."

It doesn't take long to gather Tyson and his things, and then they head over to Nate's. It's a short drive now that Nate moved downtown, so they don't even really have time to guess what Nate wants before they're parking the car and heading up to his apartment. Nate opens the door to let them in, and EJ's already there, perched on the edge of Nate's sofa with his hands clasped in front of him. He looks like some sort of stressed businessman from a bad movie, suit straining oddly across his shoulders as he hunches in it, and JT opens his mouth to chirp him about it but doesn't get a chance to say anything before EJ speaks.

"You need to sit down," he says, looking directly at JT.

"What happened?" Tyson asks. His hand comes to rest in the small of JT's back as he stands beside him. "Other than the guy getting away. We got that part."

"I went scanned around in his mind," Nate says. "Which is something I hate doing on more than a cursory level without permission, because it's, like, a huge ethics violation, but I figured it was worth it in this specific instance."

"And you found something," JT says, turning to Nate.

"I did," Nate says. He shakes his wrist, and JT sees a thin bracelet around his wrist. Nickel, JT guesses, so whatever reaction JT has to his news won't send some sort of psychic shockwave through Nate's brain. "Not everything, because by the time I realised I should look he was already making a break for it, but I got something."

JT sits down.

"So, uh," Nate says. He sits beside EJ on the sofa, and JT blinks at the way he sags against EJ, the way EJ puts his arm behind Nate, offering him support. He hadn't seen that one coming at all, but it does put him a little more at ease with reaching out to grab Tyson's hand.

"So," Tyson says, squeezing JT's hand.

"Well, the first thing is that I can confirm that you were right, Josty," Nate says. "His name is definitely Jared Lawler. That Facebook profile is the real thing, not a plant."

"Okay," JT says. Alexander has almost definitely already found that out, but Nate pulling it from the guy's head means it's information they can trust, even if JT has absolute faith in Keeper's abilities by this point. "What's the second thing?"

Nate's jaw works for a moment before he sighs. "Your teammate," he says quietly.

"Blink," JT clarifies. "That teammate?"

"That teammate," Nate confirms. He fiddles with his bracelet. "She, uh."

JT feels something cold run through his bloodstream. "Was he the one who—did he—"

"Not in the way you're thinking," Nate says. He drops his hands between his knees and meets JT's eyes. "She's alive, JT."

"She's," JT echoes. "What?"

"She's alive," Nate repeats. "She never—it was all a setup, the whole thing. What you saw, it was all an illusion."

JT knows he's probably squeezing Tyson's hand hard enough to hurt, but he can't unclench his hand. "If she was alive, she'd've contacted us by now," he says. "She would at least have told Phil."

"She's been a captive," Nate says. "I didn't get much before he went out of range, but I can tell you that she's alive, and she's been more or less in a prison this whole time, and she is _pissed as hell_ about it."

"She can blink, though," Tyson says. "Like, that's her whole thing. She doesn't have to be somewhere specific, because she can blink herself out and back in."

EJ shakes his head. "There are ways to block powers, Josty. They don't all work the same way, but nickel more or less blocks psychic abilities like Nate's, silver can keep a shapeshifter from shifting, and—"

"Copper," JT says, blinking hard as he remembers. "Copper could keep her from teleporting." The conversation comes back to him in perfect detail, Morgan laughing so hard she had to sit down as Amanda complained that her new birth control kept her from blinking, and how was she going to explain that to her doctor? He'd groaned about overhearing the conversation at the time, but it's one of those things he's buried and not quite forgotten.

"Right," Nate says. "So if they figured how to keep copper on her, she's stuck wherever she is. Has been."

"For four years now," JT says, and he can feel the horror spreading through him quickly, feeling dangerously close to nausea. "Because we abandoned her."

"Because you all believed a very, very convincing lie," EJ corrects. "You believed exactly what you were led to believe. Whoever's behind this thought of everything."

"Lawler," JT says. "For whatever fucking reason."

Nate shakes his head. "He's a hired gun," he says. "He's barely attached to this at all. His whole role in this thing is to get your attention, JT. There was nothing in his head about a larger plan, and from what I could tell, I don't think he's the kind of guy with the ability to pull this off. His brain was… kind of weird. I don't know how to explain it."

"I'd say they knew that Nate would eventually find him out, but I doubt it," EJ says.

Tyson frowns. "Why?"

"Because there are fewer than a dozen people in the world who know I have a power," Nate says. "Congratulations. You're kind of in rare company, I guess."

"So whoever's behind this sent Lawler here to dredge up things about Blink," Tyson says slowly. "We have no idea who that person might be, or why they're doing it, but we know it's on purpose. Does that sum it up?"

"More or less," Nate says, shrugging. "Now we just need to figure out where to go from here."

"To wherever Blink is," JT says firmly. "We find her. We get her back."

He looks around the room; EJ and Nate are nodding at him, and Tyson has a small grin on his face. "Yeah," he says, squeezing JT's hand. "That sounds like a plan."

-0-

The problem is that knowing Amanda's out there somewhere, alive and more or less waiting for them to come find her, is that it doesn't give them a place to start looking for her.

"What if we just start knocking on doors?" Eichs asks, frowning. It's the day after Christmas, which makes it the perfect time for a conference call, since they're still on the holiday bye and Morgan has the week off. "We go back to Barton Pond, we go up and down Super Row, we see if we can make anything happen."

"I'm starting to think that's our best course of action," Zach mutters, rubbing at his nose, his only frustrated tell. "Unless we're any closer to getting our hands on Lawler."

"The only thing connecting this to Barton Pond is the bugs," Alexander says, shaking his head. "I think it's a dead end, to be honest with you. It was a one-month cash rental, so there's no trail. The landlord said a guy matching Lawler's description paid for it, set up a computer, and then never showed up to take it back. I'm starting to think it was just to get our attention."

Tyson sighs. "No news on finding him, either," he says. "There's no record of him being in Denver. He's probably going by a fake name, and we don't know what name it is. We have nothing."

"I'm looking," Alexander promises. "All I'm doing is looking. The second something turns up anywhere, I'll know about it."

JT frowns and leans in. "How wired in are you?"

Alexander doesn't answer, sitting back and glancing away from his comm button, not meeting anyone's eyes.

"Keeper," Morgan says, voice stern. "Tell me you're not wired all the way in."

"It's Blink," Alexander snaps, still not looking at his comm button. "Fucking of _course_ I'm wired all the way in."

Tyson clears his throat. "Translation?"

"His brain wifi is on overdrive," Eichs says. "He never logs off. It's _really bad for him_."

"I'm on my way over there," Zach says. "Five minutes. I'll ping back in."

"Section," Alexander protests, but Zach glares into his comm button, and then his connection cuts out.

"So, like," Tyson says, frowning. "Your brain is a computer, and you're running it all the time without it being able to rest or reboot."

"If something happens," Alexander starts.

"That's about right, Applesauce," Morgan cuts in. "Keeper, I swear to god, I'm going to let Buttercup punch you."

"Finally," Eichs mutters.

"Can't you just, like," Tyson says, frowning. "Make a computer run whatever your brain is running, and then have it text you if it finds something?"

Alexander shakes his head. "I don't have a computer good enough to run the kinds of things I'm running. I'd lose something, or it would overload and crash. Lenovo can't keep up with me."

Tyson spreads his hands in front of himself. "You are literally a millionaire," he says. "Go buy a crazy good computer. Go buy six of them! Set them all up so they help each other! Set up your Lenovo on the side and make its only job alerting you if one of the other computers finds something you should know!"

There's silence for a moment, and then Morgan coughs. "Would that work, Keeper?"

"I'm not sure," Alexander says hesitantly. "I don't think I have the space for the number of computers it would take."

"Rent some office space," Eichs says immediately. "Most of us play pro sports, man. We'll all kick in to offset the cost."

"Wait," JT says. "Your crazy supercomputer smartphone."

Alexander shakes his head. "Even that can't handle—"

"So make ten more of them," JT says impatiently. "They can live on the floor in your bedroom. They're tiny."

There's the sound of a door opening and closing again, and then Zach's voice comes in faintly in the background. "Holy shit," he says. "Keeper's bright orange."

Morgan leans closer to her display. "Would Keeper care to explain why that's not showing up on our screens?"

"I told the comm buttons not to pick it up," Alexander says, turning to scowl at Zach. "Thanks for blowing my cover, Section."

"I'm driving to Toronto and cashing in that free punch right now," Eichs says flatly. "Bounce, is that okay?"

"Fucking do it, oh my god," Morgan says, and JT hasn't heard her sound this pissed off since they squared off against a rogue super who also went by Bounce, and the guy wouldn't stop nagging her to give up her name. "Keeper, what the fuck."

"It's Blink," Alexander says, tone defiant. "Tell me what else I should be doing."

"Not frying your brain," Tyson says as Zach reconnects his comm button. "Will the phone thing work? How do we make that work?"

Alexander sighs. "I'll need parts."

"Okay," JT says. "And?"

"And time," Alexander says. "Probably two days tops."

"I can make that happen," Zach says. "We had lunch plans, you didn't show up, I came over to visit you, you've got a nasty stomach bug. That should buy you time without the trainers getting involved."

Alexander nods slowly. "Okay," he says. "Okay. I'll try it."

Morgan sighs, and her shoulders drop a little. "Good."

"It's Blink," Alexander says again, but this time he sounds tired. "You're all doing everything you can, and when the time comes, you'll be able to swoop in and break her out. I'm just trying to do my part."

"She'd be the first in line to kick your ass if she knew you were doing this," Eichs points out. "Honestly, Keeper, I'd let her cut in front of me at this point."

Alexander closes his eyes and smiles a little. "If she was here to do it, I'd gladly let her."

There's another moment of silence before Zach sighs. "Okay, well, it sounds like Keeper and I have some shopping to do," he says. "We'll check back in later."

They say their goodbyes and disconnect, and JT lets out a breath and slumps back against the sofa. "Fuck."

"Hyman's gonna take care of him," Tyson says, moving closer to JT and leaning against his shoulder. "And we're gonna find her, JT."

JT rubs at his face. "I know, I know."

"And you're gonna get to punch someone," Tyson adds. "Like, _so_ much."

It surprises a laugh out of JT. "All I want is—"

JT's phone starts ringing, a local number that seems familiar even though JT can't place it. He shrugs and picks it up. "Hello?"

"Mr. Compher, this is Detective Silvestra," he hears. "You and Mr. Jost need to come down to the station as soon as you can. I've got some information for you."

-0-

JT's on edge as he and Tyson walk into the police station; there are a lot of reasons why Silvestra might have called them in, and they didn't have time to call Alexander, so they're going in blind. He kind of has a thing about hating going into a situation without clear information; the last time he did that, Amanda had—

Or, well, no, JT revises. Amanda's alive. Amanda's waiting for them to figure out where she's been hidden for the past four years, and hopefully she isn't too pissed about being stranded there when they finally find her.

"Mr. Compher, Mr. Jost," Silvestra says, coming out of an office to greet them. "We've had an interesting development in your case."

"Interesting," Tyson echoes. "I'm not really sure I should be excited about that at this point. The last interesting thing you had for us was pretty terrible."

Silvestra gives a short laugh. "Well, I'm not sure how much you're going to like this, but I can promise nobody else has escaped from prison."

"That's a good start," JT says, walking into her office when she gestures them inside. He sits in one of the chairs in front of the desk, waiting as Tyson follows him in and she shuts the door behind them. "So what's going on?"

Silvestra sits and folds her hands on her desk. "The burglar asked for you by name, Mr. Compher."

"The who did what now?" Tyson asks when JT just blinks. "The first burglar asked for JT?"

"Yes," Silvestra says with a nod. "He says he has information that you'll want to hear, Mr. Compher, and while we normally wouldn't indulge the idea, he didn't ask for JT Compher." She pauses. "He asked for Ticker."

JT's spine straightens, and he hears Tyson suck in a breath. "What the fuck."

"It's not in the case file, and I won't put it in there unless it's necessary to," Silvestra says, calmly meeting JT's eyes. "I have no desire to tell the world that secret, Mr. Compher. I know what it's like to want to keep a power hidden."

JT forces himself to breathe in and out, and then do it again. Finally, he nods. "Okay," he says. "So what does the guy want?"

Silvestra looks down at the case file in front of her and opens it up. "He says that he has information for Ticker about Blink. I took the liberty of looking up what he was referring to, and I found the open case file. I'm sorry for your loss, Mr. Compher."

JT takes a deep breath, remembering that Alexander had said Silvestra was clean, Silvestra could be trusted. "Actually," he says. "We recently found out that she's… uh. Blink is alive, and someone's been holding her captive this whole time, so if the burglar has some information about her, I absolutely want to hear it."

Silvestra's eyes widen slightly. "Well," she says. "You trust your information?"

"I do," JT says firmly. "We both do."

Silvestra looks from JT to Tyson. "You don't have to disclose your status to me, Mr. Jost, but I did try to find you in all the powered databases I have access to, and I came up empty."

Tyson spreads his hands in front of him. "I'm just a dude," he says. "No powers here."

Silvestra nods slowly, then turns back to JT. "I'm assuming you want to talk to Janusen, then."

"The burglar?" JT asks. "Yeah. I absolutely want to talk to him."

Tyson taps lightly at JT's knee. "Can we bring, uh. Our informant about Blink?"

"Good question," JT says. "Is that allowed? The reason we know about Blink is because someone was able to get a read off of Lawler's mind before he escaped from the Pepsi Center the other night. If we could bring that person along, we might be able to get more information out of Janusen."

Silvestra shakes her head. "He specifically asked for you, and it's already sort of bending the rules to let you talk to him," she says. "I can let Mr. Jost watch from the observation room, but that's really it. I'm sorry."

Tyson sighs, and JT turns to look at him. "Well," he says. "I guess it was worth asking. Do you want JT to talk to the guy now, or are we here to set up a time?"

"We can do it now," Silvestra says, rising from her chair. "If you gentlemen can wait for about fifteen minutes, we can bring Janusen up and have him secured in an interrogation room. Otherwise, we'll find a time that's convenient to your schedules."

JT nods. "We can do it now," he says. "Where should we wait?"

"Here is fine," Silvestra replies, walking to the door. "I'll be back when everything is set up."

"Thanks," Tyson says, smiling at Silvestra as she opens up the door and walks out, closing it behind her again. He turns to JT as soon as the door clicks shut. "How far is Nate's range, d'you think?"

"I have no idea," JT says, frowning. "Probably not all the way from his house, though. That would be an intense range."

Tyson already has his phone out, and JT can see that he has Messages open and he's typing quickly. "What if EJ flew him over and they hung out on the roof?"

"They'll have alarms," JT says, shaking his head. "There's no way they'll be able to land."

"The building next door, then," Tyson says. "He read Lawler from at least across the ice. It's worth asking."

"Okay, yeah," JT says, nodding. "If he can get down here and pick up on Janusen, then yeah, I'm all for it."

"EJ says they're on their way," Tyson replies after a moment. "Nate thinks he can, as long as the building isn't shielded. If there's too much nickel in the wiring, he doesn't think he'll be able to."

"Then I guess we cross our fingers and hope," JT says. "It's not like we can ask Silvestra if there's nickel in the building. That'll kind of be a dead giveaway that we're breaking the rules."

"Yeah," Tyson agrees, pocketing his phone again. "Fingers crossed."

-0-

Janusen has the kind of features that make him blend into a crowd; it's weird, JT thinks, because he's never going to forget this guy's face as long as he lives. He's got brown eyes and brown hair, white skin, a face that's not really handsome but not ugly, and he's average height. The only remarkable thing about him at the moment is that he's handcuffed to a link in the table, and that's not even all that remarkable, given that they're in a police interrogation room.

"Well," JT says after a moment. "I can see why you went into burglary. Nobody's gonna notice you, huh?"

Janusen snorts. "Sure, yeah, let's go with that."

"I'd apologise for being an asshole, but you did pull a gun on me that one time," JT says, trying to keep his voice even. He'd been just as bad at interrogations as he was with victims; JT was mostly good at field support, and he threw punches when needed. Talking to people was never high on his list of skills.

"I mean, that's fair," Janusen says, shrugging. "So, uh. Did the detective tell you why I wanted to talk to you?"

"She said you had something to tell me about Blink," JT says. "If it's that she's alive, save it. I already found that out."

Janusen gapes at him for a moment, but he shrugs quickly. "Okay," he says. "I've got more."

"Okay," JT echoes back at him. "I'm listening."

Janusen shifts in his seat. "I was hired to break into your place," he says bluntly. "By the guy who broke into your buddy's place. He had this whole plan to get you to notice that something was fucked up."

JT blinks. "Okay," he says cautiously. "Why'd he want me to notice that?"

"He kept going on about this girl," Janusen says. "I didn't get it, man. He kept saying he met this girl, and she really wanted to get you a message, and he couldn't figure out how to tell you."

"So he… hired you to break into my apartment," JT says slowly, trying not to think about how Amanda figured out a way to get a message to him, or why she'd send it to him, out of everyone on the team. "And then he broke into my friend's place? That's the best way to tell me something?"

Janusen shrugs. "Look, the guy's kinda wackadoodle," he says. "He said this girl wanted him to tell you that Blink said hi, and that Blink didn't talk to him herself, so—"

"Wait, wait," JT says, frowning. "Blink wasn't the one who sent the message?"

"No," Janusen says. "There's at least three girls, and the one who was talking to him wasn't Blink. I don't know who she was, or who the other girl is, except that the last girl is new. Hasn't been there long at all."

JT nods, feeling his pulse pick up a little. "Okay," he says. "So Lawler hired you to help deliver a message from a girl you don't know, for reasons you don't understand, and you don't actually have any other information for me?"

Janusen shrugs. "I mean, I have an idea of where they all are," he says. "Not an address, but a general location."

"You," JT echoes. His chest feels suddenly tight, and he forces himself to take a deep breath. "You know where they are? Where Blink is?"

"Not specifically," Janusen stresses. "Look, man, I want to tell you. I want you to find your friend, and those other girls too, I really do. But I need you to help me out, too."

JT frowns. "I'm not a cop," he says. "I can't make your sentence better or anything like that."

Janusen spreads his hands as well as he can. "You could drop the charges."

"Dude, you drew a gun on me," JT says. "Was that in the contract, too? Lawler asked you to break into my place, fuck with my PS4, yank all the cords out of my stereo, and try to shoot me when I walked in on the whole thing?"

"Nah, that's just, like, how it goes," Janusen says, shrugging. "If I'm doing a job, I have my lock picks, I have my bolt cutters, I have my gun. Tools of the trade."

"You need a new job," JT says. "One that requires fewer guns."

"Why stop when I'm good at what I do?" Janusen asks. "I've only been caught once, and it's because I was hired to get caught."

JT narrows his eyes. "Bullshit."

Janusen laughs. "I've got plenty of shit that didn't start out as mine," he says, as if that's something to brag about. "A nice TV. Art in my house. My laptop, man. All… secondhand."

"It's not less incriminating if you don't use the word 'steal,'" JT says. "I hope you know that."

"You're not a cop," Janusen says. "You said it yourself."

JT doesn't point out that the mirror behind him is two-way, and that Silvestra and Tyson are listening to every word he's saying. Janusen sure thinks he's outsmarting JT here, but if JT agrees to drop the charges, maybe Silvestra can get him on something else. "I'm not," he agrees. "Which means I can say you're full of all the bullshit I want, because it's not like I have to be careful about what I say."

Janusen sneers at him. "I'm fucking good at what I do," he says. "I work at a hotel, man. You know how easy it is to nick shit from rich assholes at hotels? I've got Tom Brady's watch at home. Bet he never even noticed it was missing."

_Bingo,_ JT thinks. He snorts and rolls his eyes for show. "Sure, okay," he says. "Whatever, fine. I'll drop the charges."

Janusen eyes him. "For real?"

"For real," JT says. He leans forward. "Tell me where Blink is. As long as we find her, I'll drop the charges so fast, man."

Janusen nods slowly. "Okay," he says. "You got a pen?"

-0-

"He's telling the truth," Nate says. He and EJ are already in JT's apartment, and JT isn't even surprised when he walks in to find them on the sofa. "Or, he's telling what he thinks is the truth. I have no idea if Lawler was telling _him_ the truth. I can only do so much."

"Was he telling the truth about Brady's watch?" Tyson asks. "Because it takes some balls to steal from Tom Brady."

"He was," Nate confirms. "I also have his address, so we can get that to your detective friend."

"Excellent," JT says. He pulls out the paper that he'd jammed in his pocket before leaving the police station. "So does this mean anything to you?"

EJ frowns as he reads it. "Farmhouse, Minnesota, rural," he reads. "JT, buddy, I hate to break it to you, but that's mostly just… Minnesota."

"Nate," JT says, turning to him. "Was he holding anything back?"

Nate frowns. "Feelings, mostly," he says slowly. "Like, something about snow, something about waterfalls."

"That's _also_ just Minnesota," EJ says. "This is useless, JT. Narrowing it down to 'somewhere near water in Minnesota' is like saying 'within a hundred miles of a mountain in the Rockies.' It's not a useful search parameter."

"I don't know, man. I'm trying to remember feelings that he picked up off of what someone else told him. There's not a lot I can go on," Nate says, frowning harder. "Something about waterfalls... breaking? Does that help?"

EJ turns to face him. "Waterfalls breaking?"

"Yeah," Nate says. "That's the best way I can think to describe it."

"Not waterfalls drying up," EJ clarifies. "Breaking? Actually breaking?"

"Tell me whatever it is you're thinking," JT demands. "It's a place to start."

EJ yanks out his phone and starts googling. "There was a town that had a ton of rain in a short time last summer," he says. "My mom was telling me about it. It rained so hard that it diverted the course of the river, and the water stopped going over the falls."

"A broken waterfall," JT says. His heart is beating quickly in his chest. "Where is it?"

"Hokah, Minnesota," EJ says, thrusting his phone at JT. "Como Falls. Destroyed last summer. It's really rural, too."

Tyson has his comm button out. "Hang on, let me get Kerfy in on this," he says, going through the initialization sequence. Alexander's face pops up, and Tyson grins at him. "We need your brain wifi. Can you, like, Google Earth search?"

"Probably," Alexander says, frowning. "I don't think it'll be quick, though. I have to manually look at images unless we're looking for something incredibly specific that I can run a program to cross-reference."

"How about we give you parameters, and you take however much time it takes you," JT suggests. "The guy who broke into my place flipped on Lawler. Long story short, we have some information on where Blink is, and you're our best shot of narrowing it down further."

"Give it to me," Alexander says instantly. "I'll reprogram the phone tree to pull images. If I don't have to monitor everything for scraps of information at all times, they should be able to pull whatever we need quicker than me doing it another way."

"Okay, well, he said 'Minnesota, rural, farmhouse,'" Tyson says.

Alexander stares for a moment. "Applesauce," he says cautiously, "that's not exactly—"

"Focus on the area of Hokah," EJ says. "Radar pulled some feelings out of the whole thing, and that's more or less our best guess right now."

"Radar," Nate says. "Seriously?"

"People _ping_ in your brain," EJ says, gently poking Nate's forehead. "Radar."

"All in favour," Alexander says, already raising his hand.

JT raises his hand and looks around; true to form, Nate's the only one who doesn't have his hand up, and he sighs and shakes his head when Alexander calls it. He's grinning, though, which is better than Eichs' reaction had been, so JT will take it.

"Anyway," JT says. "We're looking for a farmhouse near a broken waterfall. Minnesota, rural, snow in the winter. Hokah's what we found based on that, but it doesn't necessarily have to be there. If you don't come up with anything, feel free to see what else you can find."

Alexander nods, and then his eyes start glowing bright orange.

"Uh," Tyson says. "I thought you made it so the buttons couldn't pick up your whole…"

"Section made me change it," Alexander says. "Apparently I can't be trusted."

"I mean, you can't," JT points out. "Not with your own health, not when it comes to this."

"Stop calling me out on my bullshit and let me concentrate," Alexander says, and then the orange starts spreading.

"Um," Nate says, clearly alarmed.

"It's his thing," Tyson says. "He turns into an orange. It's all good."

"Yikes," EJ says calmly. "That's a big yikes."

JT snorts. "Like you have any room at all to talk, _Denverite_," he says. Just because EJ isn't wearing the suit at the moment doesn't mean JT isn't going to chirp him about the fact that it exists.

"You did choose that colour," Nate says, grinning when EJ elbows him.

"And here I thought you loved me," EJ mutters, slinging his arm over Nate's shoulders.

"You? Absolutely," Nate replies, wrapping his arm around EJ's waist. "Your fashion choices? Not even close."

"Burn," Tyson says gleefully. "Dude. I'm colourblind, and even I know it's a bad look."

"You think patterned suits are cool," EJ tosses back.

Tyson raises both eyebrows. "Excuse the fuck out of _you_, that's because they are."

EJ opens his mouth, probably to escalate the dumbest argument JT's heard in a while, but thankfully Alexander sighs. JT glances back at his screen, and the glow has receded back to just Alexander's eyes. "Okay, I'm scanning," he says. "I'll have answers for you soon, I hope."

JT glances at Tyson, then at EJ. "How soon is soon?"

Alexander shrugs. "I'll let you know if I find anything matching the description by the end of the day. It'll take me longer to sort through records and confirm if anything I find is actually viable."

"They're sustaining at least three people there," Nate says. "Blink and two other women. No idea on their identities."

Alexander nods. "I'll let you know what I come up with."

JT lets out a breath as the connection cuts. It's a start. They're one step closer.

-0-

"Babe, wake up," Tyson says, and JT blinks his eyes open. It's early January, their first off day since the Christmas break and also their last one before the All-Star break, and JT had fully planned on sleeping in until he woke up, but Tyson's shaking him gently.

"What," JT mutters. There's soft gray light filtering in through the window behind Tyson; it's snowing again, JT figures. "Can it wait?"

Tyson holds out his hand, and JT sees his comm button in it. Tyson had mixed them up once, early on in them both having one, so now there's silver Sharpie on Tyson's to prevent it from happening again.

The comm button is blinking.

"You could've answered it," JT grumbles, sitting up.

"I tried," Tyson says. "It wouldn't pick up. I have no idea why, but it's been blinking for half an hour now, and every once in a while it—"

The comm button beeps softly, four short chirps, and JT snatches it out of Tyson's hand so quickly that Tyson yanks his hand back. He's shaking as he presses the button, and he fumbles his passphrases twice before Tyson puts a steadying hand on JT's knee. He gets it right the third time, and he doesn't pause as he checks his inbox, and—

The image is hazy, cutting in and out for a second, but then it resolves, and—

"Remind me to kiss Keeper for making these things indestructible," Amanda mutters. "Ticks, listen, yours is the only contact code I remember anymore, so I fucking hope you still have your comm button. I'm alive, I'm okay, I can't blink right now. There's four of us being held here. I'm gonna try to hide my button and leave it going, so see if Keeper can track it, okay?"

"Holy shit," Tyson says, stunned, as Amanda glances to the side.

"Okay, fuck," she mutters. "Tell Phil he still owes me fifteen bucks."

The message cuts out.

"Oh my god," JT chokes out, scrambling to replay it. It's Amanda, her face thin and her hair longer than he can ever remember her keeping it. Her voice is the same as it's been in his nightmares for the past four years, and JT feels a sob rattling around in his chest as he starts it over for the third time.

"Babe," Tyson says as the message stops again. "JT, hey."

"It's real," JT rasps out. "She's _alive_, Tys."

Tyson nods and takes his hand, holding it tightly. "We need to call Alexander," he says. "And what was that about the thing with Phil?"

"I don't know," JT says. "I have no idea. They have so many inside jokes and weird code words and all sorts of stuff. I just need to—shit, I don't even have his number."

"Okay, well," Tyson says, leaning over and grabbing his phone from the bedstand. "I'll work on that. You call Alexander, get him to trace the message."

JT reaches out and catches Tyson's wrist, and when Tyson looks up, JT leans over and kisses him. "Thanks," he says quietly, closing his eyes and resting his forehead against Tyson's. "For… being here. For a lot of stuff."

He can feel Tyson's smile as he presses a kiss to JT's cheek. "Thanks for not letting me get shot that one time," he says. "And for figuring this out with me. I'm winging it too, babe."

"That's life, I think," JT says, opening his eyes. "Okay. I'm gonna call Alexander."

"Okay," Tyson says, kissing him once more before pulling back. "I'm gonna get Phil Kessel's phone number."

JT nods and taps in Alexander's code, and it only pings twice before the screen flicks on. It's Zach for some reason, not Alexander, and before JT can say anything Zach starts speaking.

"Ticker," he says, voice urgent. "I just got to Keeper's. He says he got a ping on Blink's—"

"She called me," JT cuts in, and there's so much emotion in his chest that he feels like it's going to bubble over and spill out everywhere. "Section, she called me. She left me a message."

Zach's mouth drops open, and JT can see some of his own emotion reflected back at him. "Is she okay?"

"She says she is, and that she can't blink right now," JT says. "She also says that she's leaving her button on, and that Keeper should be able to trace her message."

"Keeper," Zach hollers. "Get your ass in here. Ticker's got more for you."

"What is it?" Alexander calls, his voice faint over the button.

"Blink left him a message," Zach replies.

There's a moment of silence, and then Zach's comm button ID joins the call, resolving into Alexander's face. "Okay, what," he says, looking at JT.

"Pull it from my comm button," JT says. "She said to have you trace it."

"Oh my god," Alexander says. "She's fucking brilliant and I'm gonna kiss her for thinking of leaving a message, I swear."

JT feels a smile stretch across his face. "Funny, she said _she_ was gonna kiss _you_ for making the buttons indestructible."

Zach laughs. "Well, everyone can make out with everyone else later, as long as we find her."

"She also said there were four people, not three," JT adds. "I guess our count was wrong."

"Or they took someone new since Lawler left there," Zach says. "We need to figure out what the fuck is going on."

"Yeah, seconding that," Alexander says. "Ticker, I've got the message. I'm gonna run a trace on this, but it'll probably be a few days, okay?"

"Okay," JT says. "She, uh. She said to call Phil, so I'm gonna go do that now."

Zach whistles. "Good luck."

"Thanks," JT says, hanging up.

"Why do you need luck?" Tyson asks, leaning against JT's shoulder.

"Phil's power," JT starts. He sighs. "He can move things with his mind. Telekinesis, kind of."

"Like Amanda's is teleportation, but kind of," Tyson says.

JT smiles. "Yeah. The way Phil's works, as far as I know, is that he can… send out, like, brain waves, and then make the brain waves do things."

"Like throw an apple," Tyson says, smirking.

"Or level ten acres of forest when he found out his sister died," JT says quietly.

Tyson sucks in a breath. "Oh."

"She wanted me to call him, so I'm gonna call him," JT says. "But, uh. I didn't… I didn't stop her from falling. And I know it wasn't real _now_, but we all thought it was true then, so Phil…"

Tyson takes his hand. "I'm right here," he says quietly. "I'll sit here while you call."

"Thanks," JT says. "You've got the number?"

Tyson nods and fiddles with his phone with his free hand, and a moment later, there's a new contact sitting in JT's phone.

"Okay," JT says. "Here goes nothing."

-0-

Phil doesn't answer his phone; JT doesn't usually when it's an unknown number, either, but he also doesn't want to leave the news in a message, so he rambles out his name and number and a request for Phil to call him as soon as possible, and then he hangs up. Phil will call back when he gets it, JT guesses. Maybe a little after that, depending on how long he needs to convince himself that calling JT isn't a waste of his time.

JT takes the time to check in with Morgan and with Eichs; Morgan nods and hangs up quickly when she hears about Amanda's message, and it's only years of knowing her that lets JT see she's fighting back tears before she goes. Eichs, on the other hand, has never held a single emotion back in his entire life, and apparently he isn't looking to start now. "Fuck," he says, rearing back from his comm button. "She's—fuck."

"Keeper's on it," JT says. "We're close, Buttercup. We're so close."

"I'm skipping the All-Star Game," Eichs says flatly. "Like. That's when we're doing this, right? We're all taking the All-Star break and going to the fucking middle of nowhere in Minnesota and ending this?"

JT bites his tongue against his first response, which is that all of Minnesota is the middle of nowhere. Growing up outside of Chicago hadn't endeared him to the state, and playing for a division rival had kind of sealed the deal. "Yeah, it'll probably be then," he says instead.

"So fuck the All-Star Game," Eichs says calmly. "Fuck it with a stick, Ticker. I don't give a shit about parading around and pretending to be proud I'm on this shitty excuse for a team when Blink is out there."

JT shrugs. "Works for me," he says. "I'm sure not gonna tell you that you shouldn't come with us."

Eichs snorts. "Yeah, I kind of figured you'd be on my side."

"I mean," JT starts, but his phone rings. He glances over it and feels his eyes go wide. "Uh. That's, um. Blink's brother."

"Oh, yikes," Eichs comments blandly. "Good luck with that, buddy."

And then he disconnects the call.

"Fucker," JT mutters, rolling his eyes. He picks up his phone without giving himself time to think about it, swiping to answer it. "Hello?"

"This is Kessel," is the brusque answer. "What's up? I got your message."

"Uh," JT says, swallowing. He has no idea how Phil's going to take this. "Amanda says you still owe her fifteen dollars."

There's dead quiet for a full thirty seconds, and then there's a whoosh of air, like Phil let out a breath he'd been holding for longer than JT wants to think about. "Okay," he says, no trace of emotion in his voice. "Thanks. Let me know when and where she wants me to repay her, and I'll be there."

JT blinks. "Sure? Sure."

"Great," Phil says, and then the call disconnects.

JT pulls his phone away from his ear and stares at it. "What the fuck," he says flatly.

"What's what the fuck?" Tyson asks, wandering in. "Is it Eichs? I feel like that might be a reasonable reaction to Eichs."

"For once, no," JT says. "Phil Kessel is a weird fucking dude."

"I believe it," Tyson says, sitting down beside JT. "So, like, question. Not related to everything with Amanda, for once."

"Okay," JT says. "What's up?"

Tyson smiles at him. "So, in case you haven't been keeping track, I haven't slept in my own bed in about three months now."

JT blinks at him, then looks away. "I mean, if you want to go back next door," he starts.

"I was thinking more along the lines of me throwing out all the food in my awesome pantry and dealing with the fact that you use it as a linen closet," Tyson says lightly. "Unless you want me to go back there when this whole thing is over, in which case—"

"No," JT says hastily. "That's not what I—no."

Tyson laughs quietly. "Well, we tried not living together," he says. "I guess we suck at that."

"I guess we do," JT says, reaching out for Tyson's hand. "D'you want to go next door and grab some of your stuff? We can bring it over here. Maybe we can bring your dresser over and you can stop putting your clothes on top of mine."

Tyson laughs again, and it's bigger this time, brighter. "Romantic," he teases. "You don't want to mix our stuff together? Clear out a drawer for me?"

"If our stuff is in the same drawers, we're gonna wear each other's shirts all the time, and the guys will never stop chirping us," JT says. "And I want you to have more than just a drawer's worth of space in my life, Tyson."

Tyson's face goes soft in an instant. "Aw," he says, leaning in to brush a kiss against JT's cheek. "Nice save, babe. That was _super_ romantic."

"I can be romantic," JT protests.

"I like you just the way you are," Tyson says, patting JT's hand. "Let's go get my dresser. It'll look nice next to yours."

"Hey," JT says, catching Tyson's hand as he stands. Tyson turns, looking down at him. He takes a deep breath, but there's not really a lot of anxiety to be found in his head. "I love you."

Tyson's eyes go wide, but his smile follows a split second later. "JT," he says quietly, leaning down to kiss him, soft and sweet. "I love you too."

"Oh," JT says. "Good."

Tyson laughs. "Good?"

"I mean, yeah," JT says, and now he's smiling, too. "We're moving in together. It's a good thing you love me back."

"I think it's a good thing all on its own," Tyson says, tugging JT to his feet. "The moving in together thing is just a bonus."

"I think the moving in together thing is a technicality, actually," JT says, grinning when Tyson rolls his eyes. "But it's a good technicality."

"Well, as long as you think so," Tyson says as they head for the door.

JT smiles, letting it be as soft as it wants to be on his face when Tyson looks back at him. "Yeah," he says. "I do."

-0-

Alexander sets up a team meeting a few days later, and he nods when he sees that EJ and Nate are sitting in, too. "I found her," he says, and the words are calm but his eyes are glowing faintly. "I have her location."

"How close?" Eichs asks.

"I _found_ her," Alexander says again. "I'm not guessing, Buttercup. I've got coordinates. I know exactly where she is."

"Okay," Morgan says. "So we know where we need to be. Now we just have to figure out when."

Zach sighs. "We can fly out after our game on the 18th," he says. "Buttercup, I know your last game is the same day, but Ticker, your group plays on the 20th."

"We'll fly out as soon as we can," JT says. "And, uh. I told Blink's brother that I'd let him know, so I'm betting he'll show up, too."

JT sees Morgan and Zach both wince. "Okay," Zach says. "Do you want to handle that? I can be his contact point if you'd rather."

"I've got it," JT says. He knows that not that long ago, Zach of all people trying to help him out would have rubbed him the wrong way. There's nothing but fondness in his chest now, though, and it almost seems like a silly thing to be glad about when the real goal here is getting Amanda back, but JT's glad that he's finally been able to mend that particular fence.

Zach nods. "Okay," he says. "If he's a total asshole, tell him I'll kick his ass."

JT laughs. "Will do."

"So if we're meeting late on the 20th, when are we doing the whole thing?" Tyson asks, and JT reaches for his hand. It's actually kind of cool, the way that Tyson has fit into the team dynamic, and he's surprisingly good at managing them.

"Well, we'll do recon when we get there," Alexander says. His eyes are flicking back and forth, which means he's reading something on a screen that only he can see. It's creepy, and JT's incredibly fond of it anyway. "Hopefully we'll have a plan in place by the time you land. We'll take the 21st to regroup and rest, and then we'll move on the 22nd."

Tyson nods. "So I'll run support with you," he says. "Is everyone else in the field?"

"Not me," Nate says, shaking his head. "I can help with support, but I don't have any physical powers. I'll get my ass kicked."

"I can be in the field," EJ says. "I'm happy to follow the lead of whoever your field commander is."

"That's Bounce," Eichs says. "I just punch people. She tells me who to punch."

"Cool," EJ says, nodding. "I'm fine with that. Bounce, need another set of fists to direct?"

"Almost always," Morgan says, grinning.

"Hey, question," Zach says. "Denverite, do you have a suit that's not quite so…"

"Identifiable," Nate supplies after a moment.

"I mean, I was thinking 'orange,' but let's go with that," Eichs says. "Stealth suit? Anything?"

"I mean, I have the same suit in blue," EJ says, shrugging. "The guy I use out here is a big Broncos fan, and honestly, it's kind of funny to me."

"That you're a giant eyesore?" Tyson asks. "I mean, everybody needs a hobby, I guess."

"People can't say they didn't see me coming," EJ says, grinning. "I'll bring the blue suit, though."

"Good," Alexander says firmly. He hesitates and glances to his left, and Zach glances to his right. They communicate something that JT would have been able to tell, once upon a time, and then Zach sighs.

"So we have someone else we were thinking about bringing along," he says. "Someone with a healing power."

"Do it," Morgan says instantly. "What's the holdup?"

Alexander winces. "She doesn't know about the whole… situation. And she's a civilian."

JT raises both eyebrows. Zach's not looking at his comm button; he's looking down, and JT would bet anything that he's fiddling with his fingers, where he wears—

"It's your wife," JT guesses.

Zach looks up, startled for a moment, before he grins ruefully. "Yeah."

"If she's cool with coming along, bring her along," Tyson says. "Also, if she wants to kick your ass for not telling her about all of this until now, at least she can fix you before we need to head in to get Blink."

"A healer is probably a good idea," Nate adds. "I know Blink said she was fine, but she also said there were other people there, and we have no idea what kind of shape they're in."

"We're also heading into a fight," Eichs points out. "I'm with Applesauce. If she wants in, bring her."

"And if not, let us know," Morgan adds. "So we can pack extra band-aids."

"Okay, yeah," Zach says. "I'll talk to her this afternoon and let everyone know once she decides. It might be a day or two."

EJ hums. "So we've got our team, and we've got our battlefield," he says. "Who, exactly, are we fighting?"

There's a moment of silence, and then Morgan sighs. "We still don't know."

"They're in an abandoned farmhouse," Alexander says. "I ran down every lead attached to the property, but it's all dead ends. The place has electricity, but it's not through the power company, so they're probably running generators so they don't have to have a name on a bill. I haven't been able to track anyone going in or out, so they've got alternate means of doing that, too. It's a big question mark."

"Well," Nate says. "Uh. Maybe I can be of some help after all."

Eichs perks up. "We sneak you in, you see if you can read anything," he says. "Are you sure you can't get there early?"

"I can, actually," Nate says. "I have to miss a game since I'm skipping the All-Star game. I told them I just wanted to rest so I was ready for the back half of the season. I'll catch a flight out after our game on the 18th."

"Hey," EJ says. His voice is low, and JT's not sure if he's trying to keep his comments from being overheard by everyone else, but he doesn't really think now's the time to tell him that Alexander made the mics in the comm buttons good enough to pick up pretty much everything. "Are you sure? I can't be there early."

Nate grins and pats EJ's arm. "I'll manage, I promise. Buttercup will protect me. Right, Buttercup?"

"Damn right I will," Eichs says firmly. "Don't worry about him, Denverite. I've got his back."

EJ hesitates, but then he nods. "Okay," he says. "Good enough for me."

"Good enough for all of us," Morgan says. "Anyone else have something to add, or can I go call my boss and invent a reason to take a week off with almost no notice?"

"Great-Aunt Edna," JT says solemnly. "Tragic accident. You have to go be with her in her time of need, which for some reason has very specific start and end dates."

Morgan snorts and flips him off before disconnecting, and JT grins as he reaches forward to end the call. They've got a good group, and they're going to know what they're going up against this time.

They're going to do it. They're going to get Amanda back.

-0-

Nate disappears right after they play the Blues, and JT feels like the next two days drag by. Their last game before the break is the Red Wings, so he feels justified in not having his head 100% into it, and when they lose in overtime he finds that he doesn't actually care all that much.

"Hey," Tyson says as they're walking out of the shower. "Breathe, babe."

"Yeah, breathe," Colin says from way too close behind them, and both JT and Tyson startle. Colin grins at them, but his face quickly goes solemn. "You're gonna have a great bye week. You'll get a lot accomplished."

JT feels a weird weight settle over him, and from the way Tyson tenses, he does, too. "Okay," he says cautiously.

Colin claps a hand on JT's shoulder. "I'm gonna tell EJ the same thing, I think," he says, and then he walks across the locker room, towel secured around his hips, and says something to EJ. JT watches as EJ stands up straight, then has a quick conversation with a grinning Colin.

"Did he just," Tyson mutters.

"We can ask EJ," JT says. "C'mon, we've got a flight to catch."

Tyson nods and heads to his stall, and they quickly get dressed. EJ meets them in the hallway outside the locker room, and they make their way to the parking lot, all piling into JT's SUV. EJ's suitcase is already in the back, and JT pulls out and starts driving towards the airport. Step one of this whole plan is done, he thinks wryly as he merges onto 25.

"So," EJ says. "Colin has some kind of minor luck power, and apparently we're not subtle."

Tyson snorts. "Well, the second part I knew," he says dryly. "How did Nate not know about Colin?"

"Nate doesn't go poking around, so if Colin never thought about it in the locker room, Nate wouldn't have had reason to know," EJ says, shrugging. "I am starting to wonder if everyone on the team is a secret super, though."

"I'm still just a person," Tyson volunteers. "My power is helping Morgan keep the team meetings on track, but that's because I can and will talk over Eichs if he gets a bad case of the opinions."

"Honestly, that might count as a power," EJ mutters. "I've met Eichs."

JT snorts. "So now we have a little extra luck on our side. Remind me to thank Colin when we get back."

"I'm gonna send him a protein shake basket," EJ says. "Gluten-free. Full of vegetables. Only the good fats."

"Don't wrap it in plastic," Tyson advises. "Maybe make it less of a basket and more of a really full reusable shopping bag."

"Solid point," EJ says. "Avocados? Does he like avocados?"

"If he doesn't, I do," JT replies. "Colin will share. Nothing you give him will go to waste."

"Good point, good point," EJ says. "Okay, so I'll just fill a bag with vegetables and maybe get him a really nice shaker bottle. That sounds like a Colin gift."

"We'll all go shopping when we get back," JT promises. "We won't make you face King Sooper's alone."

EJ snorts. "I think I'm gonna have to go to Natural Grocers," he says. "You'd better not make me face it alone. The last time I went into one of those, I was convinced half of it was horse food."

"That's because half of it is," Tyson says.

"Fair," JT agrees. "So, not to change the subject, but—"

"I haven't heard anything, no," EJ says. "You guys don't have anything on your button things?"

"Nothing," Tyson says, shaking his head. "I can try calling in, but if they haven't called us, then everything is probably going according to plan."

JT sighs. "I told Morgan I'd text her when we got to the airport, and she said she'd let me know what was going on then, but I feel like she's not going to be able to tell me much when we're trying to keep our heads down going through security."

"I'll text her now," Tyson says. He pulls his comm button out of his pocket, and it's kind of amazing how quickly he navigates through the identification process and shoots off a message. He's good at this, JT thinks with no small amount of pride. Tyson's actually really, really good at this whole thing. Maybe his power really _is_ in coordination.

Tyson's comm button beeps a few minutes later, and Alexander's voice fills the air, reading the text. "Everything's going according to plan, and we'll update you when you land."

JT rolls his eyes. "Very specific."

"Very much what we were expecting," EJ points out.

Tyson laughs. "That doesn't mean he has to like it."

"True," EJ concedes. "Look, we're almost to the airport, and the flight to Minnesota is only like an hour and a half. We're almost there, and if there was something we needed to know before we got on the plane, we'd know it now."

JT makes a face. "Stop being reasonable. It's weird."

"Part of the reason nobody ever guesses that I'm Denverite is because everyone thinks I'm 100% focused on horses and hockey and there's no room left for anything else," EJ says. "I'm actually kind of good at this whole super thing, man."

"Okay, but it's also because Denverite wears a bridge that looks totally natural, and everyone knows your fake teeth are wonky as shit," Tyson says. "That's a crazy detail, man."

EJ laughs. "Would you believe it actually got easier to hide my identity after my teeth got knocked out? It seems like the dumbest thing, but I swear it's true."

"It does explain why you keep putting off getting your bridge fixed," JT says, grinning. "I swear, man, Gabe's gonna drag you to a dentist one of these days."

"Gabe can try," EJ says cheerfully. "I'm stronger than he is, and I'm _way_ more stubborn."

"Maybe the horse connection isn't random at all," Tyson says fake-thoughtfully, and JT's still laughing at EJ's indignant squawk as he pulls into the airport parking lot.

-0-

JT is glad he gave Tyson the keys to the rental; it's not like Tyson didn't also play a full hockey game tonight, but he's much more of a night owl than JT is, so it's easier for him to keep his eyes open and for JT to sort of zone out in the passenger's seat while EJ conks out in the back. It's a long drive; Hokah isn't near anything, JT remembers, and the place Alexander found for them to stay is outside of the town itself. It really and truly is the middle of nowhere, all other jokes about Minnesota aside.

"Hey," JT hears some time later, and when he blinks his eyes open, Tyson is grinning crookedly at him. "We're here. EJ and I carried our stuff inside already, but I'm not carrying you. Sorry."

JT looks out the window, but all he sees is darkness; he swivels his head around, but nope, he's got nothing. "Uh," he says, blinking hard.

Tyson laughs. "Phil Kessel's here," he says. "And so's the other Kessel. Blake."

All JT knows about Blake Kessel is that his power had been more than he could control; he couldn't join a super team because he couldn't keep a lid on it, and he couldn't devote enough time to hockey to make a real go of it because he had to spend so much time wrestling with his power. "Okay," he says cautiously.

"Get this," Tyson says, smiling widely. He reaches out and touches JT's hand, and when JT blinks—

"Holy shit," he says, yanking his hand back and whipping his head from one side to the other. There's suddenly a well-lit ranch house in front of him, with a silo and a yard and a porch, and when JT focuses on it, he sees Eichs sitting there, waving and clearly trying not to laugh. "What the absolute fuck?"

"Yeah, Other Kessel can do some sort of… reality-altering thing," Tyson says, waving his hand vaguely. "You can only find this place if someone who knows where it is tells you where it is. Alexander met us about a mile up the road and led us back down here."

"Holy shit," JT says again. "That's… wow. Okay."

Tyson laughs. "Sorry if it freaked you out, but I couldn't think of a better way to do it."

JT laughs. "I mean, it worked," he says. "Everyone else is here?"

"They are," Tyson confirms. He hesitates, glancing back at the porch. "Phil said he wanted to talk to you."

JT squeezes his eyes shut, but part of him figured this was coming. "Okay," he says. "Okay. I guess it's time to face the music."

"She's alive," Tyson says quietly. "No matter what everyone thought happened a few years ago, she's alive, okay? Remind him of that if he gets too mad."

JT smiles, but he can tell it's kind of grim on his face. "I think I owe him a little yelling," he says, unbuckling his seat belt. "I'll bring it up if it goes on for too long, okay? I can promise you that."

"Okay," Tyson says. He leans across the centre console and kisses JT, solid and reassuring. "It's okay if Phil Kessel hates you, because I love you. Got it?"

JT laughs. "Got it."

"Good," Tyson says firmly. "I'm gonna find Alexander and ask him if there's a way to get the comm buttons to do speed dial. Find me when you're done, okay?"

"Will do," JT promises, smiling.

The walk from the car to the house passes in a split-second, and Eichs nods at him without saying anything as he steps onto the porch. JT nods back and pulls the screen door open, and he walks into a kitchen lit with buttery yellow light. It was probably a lovely home at some point, but it's clearly dated now, faded wallpaper and fixtures a little too worn to be called vintage everywhere JT looks.

"Hey," someone says, and JT turns to find Phil sitting at the table. "How's it going, Comphs?"

"It's going," JT allows. "Lost to the Red Wings tonight, so, y'know. That sucks."

"Fucking Detroit," Phil says, and yeah, his scowl is exactly as impressive off the ice as it is on it. "So, uh. Thanks for giving me a heads up about this whole thing."

JT stares. "Okay, putting aside the fact that Amanda literally told me to give you a message," he says slowly, "why would I _not_?"

Phil shrugs. "I'm ornery," he says placidly. "And with how hard you avoided me after everything happened at Barton Pond, I kind of figured you hated me. I wanted to make sure we were gonna be able to work together when shit goes down the day after tomorrow."

"With how hard I avoided you," JT echoes. "You—you levelled ten acres, Kess. With your brain."

Phil frowns. "That had nothing to do with you, though."

"Had nothing," JT says, and he feels a little hysterical, repeating everything Phil's saying. "I'm the one who let her fall!"

There's silence for a moment, broken by the unsteady ticking of a clock not working right somewhere in the next room.

Phil lets out an exhausted sigh after a moment. "You've been blaming yourself for that since it happened, huh," he says, less like a question and more like a statement.

"I mean," JT starts, but Phil shakes his head.

"We all knew what it could mean, Mandy joining a super team," he says. "She said she couldn't just sit by, and we all knew she had what it took to really help people, so we did our best to just… support her, I guess. But we all knew that it might end badly one day."

JT nods. "Yeah," he says roughly. "But I was there. I could've—"

"You had no way of knowing that she wasn't gonna blink," Phil says. "Stop blaming yourself. Nobody else ever did."

JT looks down at the table and swallows hard. "Oh."

Phil blows out a harsh breath. "Is that why you've avoided me like I had the plague the past few years? You thought I was pissed at you?"

JT shrugs helplessly. "You had every right to be."

"Jesus," Phil mutters. "This is why I wouldn't make it as a super. I'm not self-sacrificing enough."

"Yeah, mood," someone says, walking in. JT's never met Blake Kessel, but the family resemblance is pretty strong. "Hey, man. Thanks for the heads up."

JT nods, and he's back to feeling bewildered. "Yeah, uh," he says. "What… was that? The message, I mean."

Phil snorts. "I thought it was the stupidest thing when Mandy set it up," he says, shaking his head. "Proof that it was her, in case there was ever a situation where I'd doubt it."

"We each have one," Blake adds. "I hope we never have to use them ever again. This has been kind of awful."

JT swallows. "I'm sorry."

"For what?" Blake asks, frowning. "_You_ didn't kidnap her."

"Which—MacKinnon's got some news on what the fuck happened at Barton Pond, but he hasn't really shared it with the rest of us yet," Phil adds. "I think we're waiting until tomorrow for the big debrief, though. It's late."

"Okay," JT says again. "That's… yeah, that makes sense."

Phil stands, and the hand he lays on JT's shoulder is surprisingly gentle. "Get some sleep," he says, sounding older than he is by a long shot. "We'll figure it all out tomorrow."

"Yeah," JT says as Phil walks away. He feels both lighter and heavier than he has in years. "Sure."

-0-

"So," Nate says. They're all crowded into the living room in the house; Alannah is in Zach's lap and Tyson is in JT's, and it's less because it's cute and more because there are not even close to enough places for people to sit. "I have info on why everything happened, and I have info on what you're gonna be up against tomorrow. What do we want first?"

"Backstory first," Morgan says. She glances around the room. "I think it's important that we all know what went on before we talk about what we're going to do now."

JT nods because it makes sense, but he's nervous; he ran away from all of this years ago, and knowing Amanda's alive now doesn't erase all the grief he went through and all the healing and growing he's done since. Explaining the past is going to dredge a bunch of it up, he's pretty sure, but he takes a deep breath and turns to face Nate.

"You're gonna be mad," Nate starts.

Eichs snorts. "I mean, chances are good."

"It wasn't a rogue super," Nate says. "In fact, it—nothing about this was super-related at all, other than Amanda being a super."

It's dead quiet for a moment. JT isn't sure who he was expecting to break it, but it sure wasn't Alannah leaning forward with a frown. "What the fuck?"

Morgan snorts loudly. "Yeah, agreed," she says. "More, please."

Nate shifts in his chair. "Okay, so," he says, glancing around. "This wasn't actually about anyone on your team at all, not really."

"You were right, I'm mad," Eichs says. "If it wasn't about us, and it wasn't about supers, then what the fuck was it about?"

"Me," Phil says, voice short and clipped. JT turns to face him, and Phil's face is turning redder and redder. "This was—if it's not supers, then it's hockey. If it's not your team, then it's me."

"Yeah," Nate says simply. "It was… yeah."

"Son of a _bitch_," Blake says. There's a sound of something crashing outside, and JT's pretty sure Phil and Nate are the only ones who don't jump. "I'll fix it, I'll fix it."

"Later," Phil says, turning back to Nate. "Details?"

"Toronto wanted to trade you," Nate says quietly. "Pittsburgh wanted to acquire you, but the price was high. Really high. They needed your trade value to take a hit so Toronto would retain salary, so they found someone who calls himself The Fixer."

"Lawler," JT says, balling his hand into a fist.

Nate shakes his head, though. "He's a pawn in all of this," he says tiredly. "He's got… I guess you'd call it the opposite of a power. Powers work really well on him, and the people behind this whole thing have been manipulating him the whole time, forcing him to be everyone they need to keep things going. He's one of the four people to rescue that Amanda mentioned in her message to you, I'm almost positive."

JT blows out a breath. "Fuck."

"Yeah," Nate says, nodding. "The other two people are a woman named Sarah Nurse, who's related to a guy who plays in Edmonton, and a woman named Julianna Iafallo, whose brother plays in LA."

"Holy shit," Tyson says, and JT wholeheartedly agrees. "So this Fixer guy has been making women disappear to fuck with NHL players?"

"Wait," Zach says, frowning. "Iafallo's sister was—is a super. I remember hearing about her. Is Nurse, too?"

Nate nods. "Sarah Nurse can convince people to do things for her, which is how they got Lawler to you, JT, and how Amanda got her comm button back. She hasn't been there long," he says. "Julianna Iafallo can do something that has to do with controlling water."

"The waterfall," EJ says, eyes wide. "She—holy shit, she _broke the waterfall._"

"She was trying to draw people in, so maybe someone would stumble across the place they're being hidden," Nate says. "It didn't work, but you can't say she didn't try."

"Okay, so," Alannah says, and her voice is businesslike. "We have four people to evacuate. Do you know anything about their medical conditions?"

"Lawler's in rough shape," Nate says. "He, uh. The Fixer didn't react well when he got back from Denver."

"Shocking," Morgan mutters. "What about everyone else?"

"They each have something implanted in them," Nate says. "Amanda thinks it's what's keeping her from blinking. I have no idea what it's doing in the other three, since it's clearly not keeping them from using their powers, but they all have one." He puts a hand on his upper thigh. "It's in there pretty deep."

"Okay, well," Alannah says, frowning slightly. "I can get them out, but it'll probably take a few minutes for each of them."

"If we can sneak me in there with you, I can do a sort of mind-share thing," Nate says. "I can link you to each of them, if having their reactions helps guide you or something."

Alannah nods. "Great."

EJ shifts, but he keeps his mouth shut. JT's actually kind of proud of him, honestly.

"So what are we up against?" Eichs asks. "Is The Fixer actually here, or are there minions, or are we just waiting for Alexander to take down a security system?"

"Unfortunately, all of that," Alexander says grimly. "I'm into the security system, and I'll shut it down when we're ready to go, but if I do it now it'll tip them off. There aren't a lot of records for me to look at in the system, but there are security logs, and apparently The Fixer's been here for a little under a week now. It coincides with how long Lawler's been back."

JT winces. He never thought he'd feel bad for the guy who broke into Tyson's apartment and pointed a gun at him, but this whole year has been one hell of a ride. "Is the security hired, or are they gang?"

"What's the difference?" Tyson asks.

"Gang believes in what's going on," Morgan answers. "Hired guys don't usually give a shit, so it's possible to get them to a point where they're not getting paid enough to deal with the trouble we're giving them."

"So we're rooting for it to be mercenaries," Tyson says, nodding. "Today sure is a day."

EJ snorts. "You said it."

"All I can tell you is that they're getting paid," Alexander says. "There's nothing in the system to indicate whether or not they know what they're guarding or if they believe in The Fixer for some reason."

"Well," Eichs says, cracking his knuckles and grinning wolfishly. "Good thing I can punch them either way."

-0-

JT wakes up before his alarm goes off, and he debates the relative merits of trying to go back to sleep versus just getting up and starting the day. He's almost talked himself into closing his eyes again when Tyson sighs and turns over to face him, and JT's not altogether surprised to see that he's up, too.

Tyson grins at him crookedly. "We can sleep in tomorrow, I guess?"

"That's the plan," JT replies. "Want to see what breakfast is today?"

"Sure," Tyson says. He rolls into JT's space and leans in to kiss him quickly. "Let's get going."

Morgan's already in the kitchen, but JT doesn't see anyone else yet; there's a bunch of food set out, boxes of donuts and some cereal and a bunch of fruit, no rhyme or reason to the spread at all. Morgan smiles at them as she starts the coffeemaker. "It's the leftovers," she explains. "The rest of us have been here for days. Hopefully this is the last of it, so eat whatever looks good."

"Cinnamon Toast Crunch looks edible, at least," Tyson says, grabbing the box. "Man, who's eating all those donuts?"

"Me," Eichs says, walking into the kitchen. "I need a sugar rush. I've been loading up."

"Power thing," JT says before Tyson can call bullshit. It sure sounds like bullshit, but JT's spent enough time with Eichs to know that he seriously means it: the more sugar he has in his system, the harder and longer he can fight.

"Powers make no sense," Tyson decides.

Eichs snorts and grabs a donut. "Tell me about it."

The rest of their expanded team trickles in over the next half hour; everyone looks more or less rested except for Alexander, which is pretty much par for the course the morning of a fight. JT nudges Tyson as he stands, nodding in Alexander's direction, and Tyson scowls and gets up, heading to drag him to the table. JT refills his coffee and pours another cup, and by the time he sits back down, the orange is fading from Alexander's eyes.

"Did you sleep at all?" JT asks, pushing the coffee across the table.

Alexander rolls his eyes. "I slept."

"No, you went into low power mode," Tyson contradicts, poking at Alexander's shoulder. "Dude. What shuts your power off? I'm getting you a helmet made out of it as a late Christmas gift."

"Nickel, just like Nate," Zach says, sitting on Alexander's other side. "Alannah and I are wiring up a guest room that I can dump him in when he gets like this."

"Good," JT says as Alexander frowns into his coffee mug. He nudges Alexander's foot beneath the table. "You need to learn how to take a break."

"I needed to check on a few things, and it never hurts to monitor," Alexander says. "I'm fine, JT. I'm in way better shape than I was with the Umbrella Man fight."

"That's not _nearly_ as reassuring as you think it is," JT says, raising his eyebrows.

"Umbrella Man?" Tyson asks, both eyebrows raised high.

"We won, but barely," Zach says. "Alexander fried an entire power grid."

Tyson hesitates. "On purpose, or were you that strung out?"

"Both," Alexander says. "I wasn't at my best, and I definitely shouldn't have made the decision. It wasn't an accident, but it wasn't really the smartest move I could've made."

"Understatement," JT mutters. "You're gonna be okay?"

"I'm gonna be fine," Alexander says firmly. "All I need to do is kill the security system and run comms. I don't think it's possible for me to fuck it up."

"You actually said that out loud," Tyson says, clearly alarmed. "What the fuck?"

JT snorts. "Alexander isn't superstitious," he says dryly. "Most supers aren't, actually. It's weird that so many of us are in sports."

"Yikes," Tyson says. He hesitates for a moment, but then he narrows his eyes at Alexander and knocks three times on the wooden table. "Can't hurt."

Alexander laughs, but he knocks on the table, too. "Can't hurt," he agrees.

EJ sits at JT's side, and when JT glances over, he feels his eyes go wide. He's in regular clothes, a tee and some sweats, but this is Denverite, not JT's teammate. He's clear-faced and focused, and when he opens his mouth to bite into his donut, he's wearing a full set of false teeth.

"Uh," Alexander says. "EJ?"

Nate snickers as he sits. "The good teeth are part of the disguise."

"Oh my god," Alexander mutters, putting his hand over his eyes. "Of course they are."

"It works," EJ says, shrugging. "Are we ready? Any changes since yesterday?"

"We're ready," Morgan says, and just like EJ is Denverite right now, Morgan is Bounce, ready to lead them all into the fray. Her hair is braided back like JT hasn't seen in years, and he can see the deep green of her suit beneath her shirt when she stands. "Code names only from here on out. If anyone has any questions before we head out, ask them now." She looks around, but nobody says anything, so she nods. "Keeper has comm buttons for those of you who don't have them already, and they'll be switched on in the field. You should just need to talk to get in touch with the group. Right, Keeper?"

"Right," Alexander says. "I didn't bother with code words for turning it on or off, so just talk and it'll pick it up. I'll be doing passive monitoring, too, so I'll be listening to everything whether you're talking specifically to me or not."

"Creepy," Nate says.

"Necessary," Morgan shoots back. "Buttercup, Denverite, Rumble, you're with me." JT glances around to find Phil nodding; he must be Rumble, then. "We're clearing a path for Ticker and Section to take Stitch and Radar in, and then we're playing distraction while they remove whatever the implants are in the captives. Crash Test is going to provide cover for you guys."

"I won't drop anything on you," Blake says. "The name's old. I'm not perfect, but I swear I have better control than I did when I got the name."

"Okay," Alannah says, smiling at him. "We trust you."

"Applesauce, you're with Keeper in the orange room," Morgan finishes. "You'll have a direct line to me and to Ticker. If anything goes sideways, let us know."

"The orange room?" Tyson asks.

Alexander gestures to himself. "It's gonna be," he says wryly.

JT snorts. "All clear?" he asks, looking around. It's a bigger team than he's ever been part of before, and a lot of the faces around the table are people he'd never thought he'd be entering a fight of this magnitude with. There's determination on every face, though, and JT's eyes land on Zach last, just as they always had.

"All clear, Ticker," Zach says, calm and focused and ready to stand at JT's side through whatever comes next. "Let's get ready to move out."

-0-

The thing about fighting like this, about cracking his fingers and looking for places where he needs to use his power, is that JT thought he'd get rusty if he didn't use it. It's like clockwork, though, springing back into his fingertips the second he calls for it.

"Clockwork," he mutters to himself, trying and failing not to roll his eyes.

"Hm?" Section asks. His hands are out in front of him, Radar in one bubble and Stitch in another, and Crash Test is out in front of them, watching as the strike team makes their way towards an unassuming-looking farmhouse about half a mile away.

"I'm making time puns in my head again," JT replies. "Don't mind me."

"Tell me later," Applesauce says, clearly amused. "Strike team, are you in position?"

"Two minutes," Bounce says. "Is Keeper ready to sink the security?"

"On your word," Keeper confirms. "I'll need about three seconds."

"Keep ready," Bounce says, and then her comm button goes silent.

"This is the worst part," Section says. "The waiting."

"It is," JT agrees. "One forty-five."

"Ticker, I can't believe I never asked this before," Applesauce says. "Do you just, like, keep track of time automatically?"

"When I'm dialled in, yeah," JT replies. "I don't just do it all the time."

"Good, because it would be weird to date a stopwatch," Applesauce says.

JT grins. "So I've heard."

Section snorts. "I can tell you all about it if you want, Applesauce," he says dryly. "Later, though."

"One twenty," JT says.

Crash Test shifts, leaning forward. "Hold on," he says, and JT's instantly on alert. "Something's—"

"Keeper," Bounce's voice cuts in. "We're made, cut it _now_—"

"Shit," Crash Test says, and he starts running. JT glances at Section, and they take off in tandem, following as Crash Test makes his way ungracefully towards the farmhouse.

"It's down," Keeper says, voice calm. "Bounce, I've got thirteen heat signatures heading in your direction."

"Got it," Bounce says. "Denverite, Buttercup, go left. Rumble, with me."

"Copy," Denverite says calmly. "Going in."

"Going in _swinging_," Buttercup adds.

"Good," JT mutters. "Punch the fuck out of them."

"I will," Buttercup says, a fierce note of glee in his voice.

"Support team, what's your ETA?" Applesauce asks.

"Minute twenty-eight," JT says, his brain doing the calculations for him, how fast they're running and how far they have to go. "Approaching from the east. We're heading towards the back based on Radar's intel, and we'll let you know if we need to change the plan."

"Copy," Applesauce says calmly. "Check in when you're in position."

"Copy," JT says. He looks ahead, where the ground is flattening out in front of Crash Test, and makes a mental note to figure out what the fuck his power set actually is when all of this is over; making people think something's not there when it really is is one thing, but it looks like he's actually changing the physical nature of things around him, which is a whole other realm of things a person can do.

"You're seeing this, right?" JT asks.

"Yep," Stitch calls down. "I don't think I've ever seen someone paving the way quite this literally before."

Radar snorts. "You and Ticker have the same sense of humour," he says. "It's honestly amazing."

"So I have a type," Section says. "Chirp me about it later."

"I plan to," Stitch says cheerfully. "Ticker, remind me to get your number. We should be friends."

JT smiles. "Definitely," he agrees. They're about ten seconds from the entry point. "Applesauce, Keeper, we're breaching."

"Turn right," Keeper says, voice slightly stilted like it gets when he's looking at multiple things at once. "Third door on the left leads to a hallway. Take it all the way down, and Radar can direct you from there."

"Copy," JT says, turning right. Crash Test is already pushing the third door on the left open, and then they're racing down a long, narrow hallway.

Crash Test pulls to a stop and glances back. "Radar, what do you have?"

Radar closes his eyes for a moment. "Left," he says. "It's not gonna open."

"Bullshit it isn't," Crash Test says, and he hits the door so hard that it flies inwards, hinges snapping off of the doorframe on one side as the frame splinters on the other. JT doesn't let it phase him, just races into the room and looks around.

"Left, Ticks," he hears, and JT spins to his left and freezes a guard as he draws his gun. There's another guard to that guy's right, and JT freezes him, too, watching as they topple over.

It's only after both guards are on the ground that JT registers who had called out to him. He spins back around, and his eyes catch on—

"Oh," he says, voice not wavering even though he's feeling so many emotions right now that he doesn't know how he's keeping it in check. "Applesauce, I have eyes on Blink."

Amanda grins and waves at him from inside the cell she's sitting in. "You brought me a whole party," she says. "Section, hey."

"Blink," Section says, and his voice isn't nearly as calm.

"What, no hi for me?" Crash Test asks, and Amanda's eyes widen as she stands up.

"Are you," she says, and now she sounds unsteady, too.

"Crash Test," Blake offers. "Back up, Blink, I'm gonna knock the shit out of this door."

"Wait," JT says, walking over. He puts his hand on the lock and flexes his fingers. "Blink, how long since they last opened this?"

Amanda shrugs. "Three days?" she estimates.

Crash Test swears, but JT ignores him. "Gotcha," he says. His fingers flex again, and the lock rewinds, stepping back through time quickly at first, then more slowly, until the pins slide open. He grabs the handle and tries it, and the door swings open, and suddenly he's got two arms full of Amanda Kessel as she hurls herself at him, hugging him tightly.

"Hey," he whispers, closing his eyes and hugging her back for all he's worth. "Oh my god."

"Oh my god," Amanda echoes, and then she lets go and jumps into Crash Test's arms.

JT looks at Radar. "I'm gonna unfreeze the guards," he says. "Help me drag them into the cell, and then we can lock them in."

"Oh, good call," Radar says. "I was kind of wondering why you didn't just let him bust it down."

"I don't have to fix it if he doesn't break it," JT says, amused, as he unfreezes the guards. He grabs one under the shoulders and Radar grabs the other, and together they drag the guys into the cell. JT goes through their pockets, pulling out anything that looks like it could be a key, a weapon, or a communications device, and then he and Radar step out of the cell and JT fast-forwards the lock, stopping when the bolt slides back into place.

Amanda appears to be done hugging Section, too, and she's waiting for them with a grin. "Man, I kind of love seeing them in there," she says. "What's the next step? There's other people here. I don't know how much of my message made it through."

"Four people," JT says, glancing around. "You, Nurse, Iafallo, and Lawler, right?"

Amanda looks surprised. "Wow."

"Hi, I'm Radar, and I'm really sorry but I've been reading your mind for the past, like, three days," Radar says with a wave. "And, actually, I'm here so I can help Stitch get that implant out of your thigh so you can blink again."

Amanda's mouth drops open. "I'm gonna kiss you," she says, turning to Stitch. "You can do that?"

"I can do that, but I'm married to Section, so the kissing's off the table," Stitch says, grinning. "You can still kiss Keeper, though. I heard that was a possibility."

Amanda narrows her eyes at Section, then at JT, but she nods a moment later. "Okay," she says. "Get this fucking thing out of me."

Radar takes her hand, then takes one of Stitch's, and breathes out as he closes his eyes. Stitch hums a moment later, looking up at Amanda. "This isn't gonna feel great as it's happening," she warns. "I'll fix it up as soon as it's out, but it's going to hurt."

Amanda's smile is grim. "I'll deal," she says. "Do it."

Stitch nods and holds her palm above Amanda's thigh, and Amanda sucks in a breath as Stitch's hand starts glowing a soft blue. Amanda grunts and squeezes her eyes shut, and then a small, thin disc slices through the leg of her pants and hovers above Stitch's hand. She drops it immediately, then pushes her hand against Amanda's thigh, and the pain on Amanda's face clears instantly.

"Thanks," Amanda says, and then she _blinks_. She reappears a few seconds later, and she spins in a circle and laughs. "Oh my god, I can blink again!"

JT's smiling just as hard as she is, and Section's in the same boat, JT sees when he glances over. "Hey," JT says to his comm button. "Applesauce, Keeper, Bounce. We've got Blink."

"Hell yes," Bounce shouts. "We've got a fight on our hands. Keep it going."

Amanda—or, no, JT thinks; she's got her power back, so she's Blink again—Blink walks over to the guard's desk and pulls a drawer open, grabbing her comm button out and holding it in her hand for a moment. She looks up at JT and grins. "I've been waiting to get this back full-time," she says. The comm button pulses orange, showing its connection, and Blink laughs.

"Okay," she says, and JT hears his teammates whoop over their comm buttons. "What the fuck is an Applesauce?"

-0-

Rescuing Sarah Nurse goes fine; she doesn't enjoy the implant coming out any more than Blink had, but she grins and gleefully stomps on it once it's on the floor. "Good fucking riddance," she says, turning to face the rest of them. "I'm Sway, and I'm _so_ fucking ready to get out of here."

"Good, because we're definitely not sticking around for long," Blink says firmly. "Two more stops and then we're blowing this popsicle stand."

"Can I blow it _up_?" Crash Test asks hopefully.

Blink snickers. "Maybe," she says, patting him on the arm. "C'mon, we're halfway there."

Julianna Iafollo grins as they break into her cell, JT dropping the guards and then opening her door. They go through the removal process again, and then she laughs. "Finally," she says. "I'm Float."

Blink nods. "Okay," she says. "Now we just have to get Lawler."

Float makes a face. "Do we have to?"

"Float," Sway sighs. "Look, he's not at fault here."

"Lawler's the one who tricked her into getting snagged," Blink explains. "She's not… fond of him."

"I'm sure not," Float snaps. "Fine, whatever. Let's go rescue Lawler, and then let's get _out_ of here."

Blink smiles. "Sounds good," she agrees.

The cell she leads them into doesn't have any guards. It does have the same kind of door as JT's been opening, though, and there's a thin woman sitting inside, arms wrapped loosely around her knees.

"Uh," JT says, and the woman looks up. There's shock on her face, and then her features melt, landing briefly on a blond man before shifting again so JT's looking at Janusen.

"Well, that's for sure him," Section observes. "What's the plan here?"

"Hey, Jared," Sway says, walking up to the door. "Where's your face, buddy? Let me see your face."

Janusen's features fade away, and then JT's finally face-to-face with the guy from the Facebook profile that Applesauce found a month ago. He;s older, thinner, looking like he's been through a hell of a lot since the photo in the pool. "Hi, Sarah," Lawler says, and his voice is low, a little rusty. "Is this a good face?"

"That's the one I asked for, yeah," Sway says, smiling at him. "My friends are here to help us all break out, okay? We want to help you, too."

Lawler laughs and points at JT. "He doesn't like me," he says. "I made him mad."

"You shot at me, buddy," JT says. "But you told me that Blink said hi and that's the important part, right? She asked you to tell me, so you told me."

"You're the only one whose location I knew for sure," Blink mutters. "I couldn't remember anyone's else's comm button code, but yours kept pinging in Colorado, and I figured if I led you to Barton Pond you'd figure it out eventually."

JT nods; that's one question answered, then. "I was mad that you shot at me, Jared, but I'm not mad anymore," he goes on. "We want to help you get away from The Fixer, but you have to trust us, okay? We need to take the implant out of your leg."

Lawler focuses on JT, and it's the most lucid he's seemed yet. "You want to take my disc out?"

"Yeah," JT says cautiously. "It's—"

"It's my disc," Lawler says, and he changes again, back to being the thin woman with her arms around her legs. "It's how I know there's a job for me. I can't not have a job, Ticker. I need my job."

"We can get you another job," Section says. "A better job, I promise. One with health benefits."

Lawler's arms drop. "Health benefits?"

"Yeah," Section says, smiling at him. "Full coverage. Whatever doctor you need, whatever else you need."

"What if," Lawler says, shifting, shrinking down. His voice rises, and he looks like a little girl, maybe nine or ten. "What if there's someone else who needs them?"

It's not like JT wasn't going to repeatedly punch The Fixer anyway, but the more the pieces click into place, the more furious he gets. A single dad, a kid who needs things, a rogue super who doesn't give a shit if he uses people up and spits them out broken if it means he gets what he wants… JT's gonna tell Buttercup the whole story and let him go to _town_.

"What's her name?" Sway asks gently. "She has your eyes, Jared."

"Annalise," Lawler says. "My sweet Annie."

"Is she somewhere safe?" JT asks. "We'll get her what she needs, buddy. We'll make sure your kid is safe."

Lawler nods. "She's with my mom," he says, looking at Sway. "She's gonna be safe? Boss doesn't know about her. I don't want him to know about her."

"I swear to you, Jared, we'll make sure your daughter is safe," Sway says, and there's so much power in her voice that even JT's convinced of it. "Let us help you, buddy, okay?"

"Okay," Lawler says, standing up. "Okay."

JT undoes the lock and steps into the cell cautiously, but Lawler doesn't lunge for him, doesn't make a break for it. He watches JT warily, but when Stitch and Radar walk in, he smiles at them hesitantly.

"Hey, Jared," Stitch says, taking one of his hands. "I'm Stitch. It's gonna hurt a little coming out, but I'll fix it as soon as we have it, okay?"

Lawler shrugs. "It hurt going in, too," he says, and JT's blood boils. "I'll be okay."

Radar holds out his hand. “I'm here to help," he says, quiet and reassuring, and Lawler takes his hand and then they're standing there, a quiet trio in a cell all holding hands. Stitch gives him a reassuring smile as she drops his hand, and then she reaches out with a hand already glowing blue, and—

Lawler _screams_ like the other three hadn't, clawing at his leg. "No, no," he says wildly, and Radar drops his hand and puts himself between Lawler and Stitch. "Boss knows, Boss knows, he—"

Lawler goes silent, and then he stands up straight. His face blurs, stopping for a split-second on face after face before disappearing again. He finally settles on a big, burly form that JT doesn't recognise, and he takes a swing in JT's direction.

"Hey, whoa," JT says, stepping back. "Hey, what's going on?"

"Jared," Sway says, and Lawler falters, turning to her. "Jared, _stop_."

Lawler whimpers, but then his leg twitches, and he turns towards the cell door, throwing himself at it as Crash Test hauls it closed, locking them inside.

"It's the disc," Radar snaps. "That's why everyone had one. It's got some sort of mind-controlling thing in it, and it's making him do this."

"If I freeze him, can you take it out?" JT asks, holding his hands out in Lawler's direction.

"I don't know," Stitch says frantically. "If you freeze him, doesn't that freeze all of him? I don't know what kind of interaction that's going to have."

"Okay, okay," Blink says, and suddenly she's in the cell with them. She locks eyes with JT. "I'll be right back," she says, and then she throws her arms around Lawler and they're both gone.

"What the fuck," Crash Test bellows, throwing the door back open.

Section points at the ground. "Look," he says. "The disc kept her from blinking. She can't blink it at all, so it stayed behind."

Sure enough, the disc is sitting on the ground, and Crash Test walks forward and crushes it beneath his foot. "Where _is_ she?" he asks, looking around, and JT feels a hollow sense of deja vu, Blink blinking away, nobody being able to locate her, her body falling, falling—

JT startles backwards as Blink appears in front of him. "Okay, well, that was fun," she mutters. She looks around at all of them, and her face crumples for a second before she straightens. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry," she says. "I blinked him out of here, and then I blinked him to his mom's house with his kid. He's himself again. I'm not gonna say he's _okay_, but I figured bringing him somewhere else was better than bringing him back here."

JT takes a long, even breath. "Good call," he says. "Sorry. We're all a little… blink-shy."

Blink nods at him, half a smile on her face. "Sorry."

"Well," Stitch says after a moment, and JT's just glad someone else is taking the lead for half a second. "That's everyone, right?"

"Yeah," Blink confirms.

"Then Radar and I are going to head back to the orange room," Stitch says. "The rest of you—"

"Yeah, change of plans," Applesauce pipes up. "Keeper and I are on our way down. There was… let's go with 'a little fire,' so we had to evac."

"A little what now," JT asks.

Float holds a hand out. "On it," she says. "But if they're already on their way here, might as well keep coming. We can set up a safe room here just as well as anywhere else."

"I have some equipment," Keeper says, and JT's relieved to hear that he sounds mostly normal. "The superphones, mostly. Everything else is… yeah."

"Toast," Applesauce sums up. "Long story short, Keeper tried to find where the discs were getting their power from, and his computers didn't like that."

"Cool, great," JT mutters. "Bounce, you copy?"

"Stay to the back of the building," Bounce replies, voice strained. "Support team, we could use you up here if everything's secure back there."

JT locks eyes with Section, then turns to Stitch. "Are you guys—"

"Go," Stitch says firmly. "We're good here."

JT nods, and then he takes off running.

-0-

"Ticker," JT hears as he runs into the front of the house. He turns towards Bounce's voice, hands already out, and freezes the guy advancing on her. She flashes him a thumbs-up, then turns and shoots a flurry of small red balls into the face of the guy approaching on her left.

"Okay, cool," Crash Test says. Before JT can ask what about this qualifies as _cool_, Crash Test hurls himself into the fight, grabbing a guy around the neck and tossing him to the side like he weighs about five pounds.

"Huh," Blink says. "He's a hell of a lot stronger than he was the last time I saw him."

"He says his control's better," JT offers. "Also, Rumble's here somewhere, so—"

Blink grins, and then she's gone.

JT sighs. "Right," he mutters. She'd always been in the habit of doing that.

"Okay, I'd say we should divide and conquer, but I think they already divided," Section says. "I'm not really sure who's conquering."

"The only thing I'm sure of is that there are more of them than I thought there were gonna be," JT says. He glances back. "Sway, Float, you guys can stick with us or do your own thing. I don't know what you prefer."

"I prefer not fighting, usually," Sway mutters, "but you know what? I'm making an exception for this particular group."

There's a slight hissing noise, and then JT's comm button pulses. "Okay, secondary orange room set up," Keeper says a moment later. "I've got Applesauce, Stitch, and Radar on site. Sound off, everyone."

Everyone on the team checks in, one by one; there's nobody missing, which makes JT's breathing come a little easier. "Who needs backup?" JT asks when Denverite reports that he and Buttercup are fine.

"Find Rumble," Bounce says. "He was looking for The Fixer."

JT nods. "Float and Sway, d'you—"

"We'll help, uh," Float says, nodding at Bounce. "That one?"

"Bounce, incoming support," JT says. "Section and I will find Rumble."

"I'm upstairs," Rumble says. "I can't find the fucker. He's—"

JT listens hard, but Rumble doesn't say anything else. He turns to Section, eyebrows raised, and Section nods. "Okay, cool," JT says into his comm button as he and Section make their way through the room. "Rumble, if you can give us more specifics on your location, we'll meet you there."

Blink appears in front of them. She puts a finger to her lips, then reaches out and grabs each of them by the hand.

There's nothing physically disorienting about blinking; you're in one place and then you're in another, unless you're actually Blink, but JT thinks that might actually be more disorienting than if he felt some sort of vertigo or nausea or whatever. He's in the midst of the main fight, and then he's standing in a deserted room in the upper floor of the farmhouse, the fight a distant noise below him.

Blink points. "I was following," she says quietly. "Rumble was walking, looking around, and when he stepped through that doorway, he vanished."

"That's a terrible doorway feature," JT mutters. "Keeper, do you have anything? Any trace of Rumble?"

"No," Keeper replies. "His comm button cut out. I've got nothing on him."

"Well, that's bad," Section says. "Keeper, we've got visuals into the room. It's just a fucking room."

"Okay, okay," Keeper says. "Give me—okay, yeah."

"Words, Keeper," Blink says. "What do you have?"

"An idea," Keeper says, and his voice is doing the weird overmodulated thing again. Blink makes a face, and JT can't help but agree. "Applesauce, look, it's—"

"Yeah, got it," Applesauce says. "Hey, Blink, can you blink me up there? I've got a new toy."

"Cool, I love toys," Blink says. She pops out, and two seconds later she's back, Applesauce a step to her left. "Hi, by the way."

"Hey," Applesauce says, grinning at her. "Good to have you back. We can do intros later."

"Yeah, for sure," Blink says. "What's the toy?"

Applesauce pulls out one of Keeper's superphones and points it at the doorway that took Rumble, then pokes at the display. "Hey, Keeper, I'm no expert," he starts.

"Yeah, no, that's bad," Keeper says. His voice is more distorted. "You need to—"

"You need to get your brain out of that computer before I blink back down there and yank you out of it," Blink says. "We talked about this! Five years ago!"

Section sighs. "Blink," he says quietly. "A lot of things… came unstuck, after you…"

Blink squeezes her eyes shut and nods. "Keeper," she says again. "Stay with us, okay? Stop being a computer and be a human."

"Yeah," Keeper mutters, but he sounds a lot better, and JT lets his shoulders relax a little. "I'm here. I've got it."

"_I've_ got it," Applesauce says suddenly. "Keeper, pull the visual I'm getting. I think if you fry the circuit at the upper left, the field should overload, and we can just—"

Something in the doorway crackles, and the scene through the doorway flickers a few times before it changes entirely. Rumble's visible inside, in the midst of a group of people a lot bigger than he is, and Blink makes an inhuman noise and appears by his side in an instant.

"Okay, cool, well," Applesauce says. "We're in, but I'm stuck up here until Blink's less, uh. Preoccupied."

Section holds a hand out. "I can bubble you," he offers.

Applesauce shakes his head. "I'll follow you," he says. "You do what you need to do. I'll see if I can get Keeper any other data."

"Keep your ass hidden," Keeper says sternly. "Point the phone at all the doorways and windows and stuff and I'll be able to get what I need. You don't have a suit or protection or a power, Applesauce, so don't get yourself in trouble."

JT taps his comm button off and catches Applesauce by the hand. "Hey," he says quietly. "You sure about this, Tys?"

Applesauce smiles at him. "I'm good, I promise," he says, and it's Tyson, bright eyes and wide smile and so much of JT's heart reflecting right back at him. "I want to make a joke about getting ready to rumble, but I'm also kind of afraid he'll overhear me."

JT laughs. "Okay," he says, letting Tyson go. "Keeper's right. Stay hidden and let the supers take care of all the bullshit."

Tyson laughs. "Sure, Mr. I'm Not A Super."

"Oh, fuck off," JT says, amused. "You know what I mean."

Section coughs, and when JT glances over, he's giving them an amused look. "Now I know what Buttercup was always bitching about."

"I'm suddenly glad Ticker turned his comm button off," Buttercup says promptly. "Gross."

"Don't hate us because you want to be us," Applesauce says, and the switch is effortless, JT's boyfriend turning into his teammate before his eyes. "Okay. Heading in."

Section nods at JT, then walks into the room. He holds his palms out in front of himself like he's pushing against a wall, and a thin stream of light shoots out, wrapping around one of the guys attacking Rumble and yanking him into the air. JT aims and flexes his fingers, and the guy freezes. Section floats him towards the wall and sets him down, and then he grabs another guy.

"Rinse, repeat," JT says, grinning when Section laughs. They work their way over towards the pile of guys they're creating, and JT reaches down to unfreeze them as his internal timer for each of them ticks down. Before long, they've got about half of the people attacking Rumble and Blink on their side of the room, and from there it's easy to fall back into their old rhythm of bubbling, freezing, dumping, and unfreezing, pulling people out of the fight and keeping them from getting back into it.

"This is kind of weirdly easy," Section says a few minutes in.

JT snorts. "Yeah, tell me about it."

"I mean," Section starts.

Rumble lets out a yell, and JT and Section both spin to face him. There are two guys on him, and one of them is holding a disc against his forearm. It looks exactly like the ones Stitch had pulled out of the captives, and JT sucks in a sharp breath and darts forward.

"There's some kind of power shield," Blink says, smacking her hand against an invisible wall. "I can't get in. I don't know what to fucking _do_—"

"Heads up," Applesauce hollers, and JT spins around to see him darting out from behind the desk he'd been using as cover. He draws his hand back and throws something towards them, a look of pure concentration on his face, and JT watches as the apple sails through the shield and hits the guy with the disc square in the side of the head. It startles him enough that he flinches, and it gives Rumble the chance to grab him and flip him. The shield crumbles, and Blink grabs the other guy and slams him bodily into the floor.

"Did you just," JT asks, turning to Applesauce.

Applesauce laughs. "Look, there were extras after breakfast," he says. "I thought I might want a snack, and, well."

Section elbows JT lightly. "Marry him right now," he says, loud enough for everyone to hear it.

"I'm incredibly curious," Keeper says. "But also, three guys in the next room. Two of them have been pacing around while you fought in there, and the third has just been sort of sitting stationary."

JT inhales sharply. "The Fixer."

"Hang tight," Bounce says. "We're heading your way. Don't fucking engage until we get up there. Blink, that means you."

Blink scowls. "You're no fun, Bounce."

"I'll give you fun," Bounce mutters. "Two minutes out. Ticker, count us in."

JT nods and glances around. The guys he and Section knocked out are starting to come to again, woozy and disoriented; they'll be too out of it to help, unless everything goes massively pear-shaped, so he leaves them to it and walks over to Applesauce.

"Nice," he says, elbowing him lightly. "Although if you were hoping to trade in your code name, you should know that you're never getting rid of it now."

Applesauce grins. "Why would I want to do that?"

"No idea," JT says, smiling back. "We should tell Colin that his good luck charm came in handy. That was too many coincidences lining up all at the same time for it to be anything else."

"Are you saying my aim isn't always perfect?" Applesauce asks, putting a hand over his heart. "Ticker, I'm hurt."

JT laughs, and then Blink's there, reaching for Applesauce. "We have a minute, so let me get the civilian back to his Keeper," she says, grinning, and then they're gone.

"Cute," Section says dryly. "How long have you been holding that one in?"

Blink appears in front of them again, already laughing. "Years," she says cheerfully. "I thought of it when we were fighting… what was her name? The cat lady with the whiskers."

"Madame Purrfect," JT says, wrinkling his nose.

"Right," Blink says, nodding. "Glad I got the chance to use it."

"We're glad we got the chance to hear it," Keeper says quietly, and JT straightens up as Section nods.

"Well," Blink says, and her smile doesn't waver. "You'll be glad to know that I've got four years' worth of saved-up puns just waiting to be let loose, so keep listening."

Buttercup laughs, and it echoes between the comm buttons and the hallway as he walks in. "Can't wait to hear them," he says, and honestly, JT's never agreed with him more.

-0-

The Fixer is tall and thin, and JT's first thought is that he'd look more at home running some sort of online gambling ring than kidnapping powered siblings of NHL players. He sneers at them, though, and that's a look JT's seen on the faces of enough rogue supers to know that's exactly what he's looking at.

"Well, this came far later than I figured it would," The Fixer says. "Honestly, I was starting to—"

"Hey, Frank?" Float says, stepping out of the group. "Shut the fuck up."

"Frank?" someone mutters.

"It worked," someone else replies, and, well, yeah.

The Fixer frowns down at Float. "You're being rude."

"I'm sorry, _she's_ being rude?" Sway says incredulously. "Which one of us here kidnapped and imprisoned three women over the course of four years, and who didn't?"

The Fixer sighs. "I had my reasons," he says dramatically.

"Stick them up your ass," Sway says pleasantly.

"Ex_cuse_ you?" The Fixer says, standing up. He's—JT has to blink, because the guy is wearing a _cape_, unfurling behind him as he sweeps a hand back. "You can't just—"

"Can I punch him now?" Blink asks loudly. "I really want to punch him now."

"I have things to say!" The Fixer yells. "Don't you want to know why I did what I did?"

"Greed and a serious lack of ethics," Sway says flatly. "Am I missing anything?"

"I would hardly say," The Fixer starts.

"Terrible fashion choices," Float cuts in. "Maybe that made him evil. Those pants would make me want to resort to a life of crime."

The Fixer's jaw drops. "My pants are iconic!"

"Your pants are a mistake," Blink corrects. "Look, all in favour of just ending this?"

JT raises his hand, looking around. Everyone on their team has a hand in the air, and several of them look like they're barely holding back from cracking up. Buttercup in particular looks like he's seconds away from losing it.

"Anyone opposed?" Blink asks.

The Fixer and one of his goons raise their hands. The Fixer glares at the other goon, who shrugs and takes a large step back.

Float points at him. "Smart," she says. "You get a good word with the police, bud. Just sit down and we won't punch your whole face, okay?"

"Sure thing," the guy agrees, sitting quickly. "You all have fun now."

"Thanks," Float says, smiling.

"Hey, Ticker," Sway calls out. "Remember how I said I don't really like fighting?"

"Yeah," JT calls back. "You said something about making an exception for these guys."

Sway laughs. "I did," she agrees, and then she walks the three steps towards the remaining goon, hauls back, and punches him squarely in the jaw.

The guy goes down like a sack of bricks.

"Hey, Float, do you want a shot at Frank?" Blink asks, gesturing.

"My name is The Fixer," The Fixer snaps.

"Nobody asked you, Frank," Float says without missing a beat. "You know what, Blink, I'm fine with you taking my shot for me."

"Aw, thanks," Blink says, smiling at Float. It slides off her face as she turns to face The Fixer. "Hey, Frank. D'you have a family?"

"A family," The Fixer says, shaking his head. "Why does that matter?"

"I'm just wondering," Blink says, taking a step towards him. "I've got one, y'know? Crash Test and Rumble, they're my brothers."

"Ah yes," The Fixer says, drawing himself up again and sneering in Rumble's general direction. "Your _brothers_, who are the reason—"

"And Section and Buttercup," Blink cuts in. "Ticker and Bounce and Keeper, they're my family, too." She takes another step in. "And you made them think I was dead."

"Boo hoo," The Fixer says. "People die every day."

"But _I didn't_," Blink says, voice rising. "I was here, Frank, the whole fucking time, wasting away in this fucking farmhouse in the middle of fucking _nowhere_ because someone asked you for a business transaction, and your solution was _kidnapping_!"

The Fixer blinks. "Yes?"

"Oh my god," Blink yells, and then she blinks out, reappearing right behind The Fixer. She shoves him forward, then blinks around and catches him as he falls, pulling him down as she thrusts her knee up. She hits him square in the chest, and JT can hear him cough out a breath.

The Fixer falls as she blinks away again, and then she's behind him, driving an elbow into his lower back and sending him to the ground.

"Blink," Bounce says, voice even.

"A minute," Blink snaps. "Crash Test, I need you to make a hole in the ceiling. Eight feet around, okay? A nice big hole."

"Uh," Crash Test says. He glances around, but JT's pretty sure nobody here has a clue what's going on. "Sure thing, Blink." He claps his hands and a part of the ceiling just disappears, and suddenly there's a sunbeam shining through the dust particles swirling in the air.

Blink bends over, getting a hand in The Fixer's cape and yanking him up. "Remember what you showed my family?" she says almost conversationally. "You bragged about it enough to me. Remember? You were so proud of yourself."

"Blink," The Fixer says, gasping. "Amanda. Please."

"You caught me in a blink, and then you blinked in a perfect copy of my body," Blink says, as if The Fixer hadn't spoken. "You blinked it in fifteen stories up, and you made them watch me hit the ground, Frank."

"You weren't hurt," The Fixer says. "I didn't hurt you, so—"

Blink laughs incredulously. "You're delusional," she says. "But you know what? I'm gonna cure you of that. I'm gonna let you know what it's like to _fall_."

And before anyone says anything else, they both disappear.

Blink's back a moment later, standing beneath the hole in the ceiling, gazing up.

"Uh," Buttercup says. "Blink?"

A distant screaming starts, getting louder as The Fixer falls towards them, and Blink holds up a finger.

"Blink," Section says, sounding a little more stressed as he brings his hands up, staring through the hole.

The screaming is loud, now, and just as a shadow passes into the room, Blink's gone again, and a moment later, she's crouching over the still-screaming form of The Fixer on the floor, safely blinked out of freefall.

"Don't like the taste of your own medicine, huh," Blink says softly as The Fixer's screaming peters out, and then she knocks him unconscious.

**Six Months Later**

"Hey," JT says as the door opens. Phil's face isn't exactly smiling, but it's pretty neutral, which is kind of the same thing with him, JT's come to find. "Morgan went right around back, and she told us we were in charge of bringing everything in."

"What did you even bring?" Phil asks, stepping back and letting Tyson and JT in. "Eichs and Nursey brought enough booze to drown a whole farm, and Blake and I went into town the other day and got enough food."

"We've got more booze, I think," Tyson says. "And dessert. Lots of dessert."

"Well, if it's dessert, it's allowed," Phil says graciously. "Just put it wherever, I guess. People will find it when they're looking for it."

Tyson laughs and sets his tray down as Phil wanders away. "Honestly, this is exactly what I was expecting when we got an invite to a Phil Kessel party."

"I think this is an Amanda Kessel party, actually," JT says. "Phil's not hosting, he's just wandering around his own house, grumbling about all the people in it."

"Mood," Tyson says, nodding. "C'mon, let's get everything else inside, and then we can find the rest of the team."

It's quick work to make another trip to the car and back, and then Tyson reaches out and takes JT's hand before they walk out onto the porch. Everyone else is here, JT sees as they look around: Phil and Blake are standing near the grill, arguing with Eichs about something; EJ and Nate are talking to Zach and Alannah; Julianna and Sarah are pointing at something on Morgan's phone. JT smiles as he catches sight of Amanda and Alexander, crammed into the same chaise lounge by the pool; he's pretty sure nobody saw them both swearing they'd kiss the other as a sign of anything other than relief, but he's equally as sure that they haven't been out of each others' sight for longer than a hockey game in months. 

"So, hey," Tyson says, squeezing his hand. "You finally finished everything up with Silvestra?"

"Yeah, finally," JT says, groaning. "She was way less than pleased about me dropping the charges, but I finally got her to do it when I gave her Nate's info about Janusen's actual home address and they were able to connect him to a bunch of other stuff."

"Awesome," Tyson says. "I know she was pissed about not getting to arrest the mastermind."

JT snorts. "She'll live," he says dryly. "She doesn't have jurisdiction in the middle of nowhere in Minnesota, and I don't think she wants the collar badly enough to move."

"Yeah, probably a good call to talk her out of that," Tyson says. "The Fixer's going to rogue super jail anyway, so it's not like she'd be able to glare at him in lockup."

"I still can't believe his name is actually Frank," JT says. "I really thought they were just picking a random name to piss him off."

Tyson laughs loudly, which draws Alexander's attention. He smiles and pushes his sunglasses up onto his head, waving them over, and JT doesn't let go of Tyson's hand as he heads that way.

"Hey," Amanda says. "How's it going, guys?"

"Good," Tyson says. "Question, though: how can you be curled up on a human furnace when it's so goddamn hot out? Is your second power that you absorb heat?"

Amanda grins and pats Alexander's chest. "I like him hot," she says, and she laughs harder when Alexander splutters and goes red.

"Ew," JT says, grinning when Amanda rolls her eyes. "So, any updates on Lawler?"

Amanda's face goes serious as she sighs. "He's doing better," she says. "He's in a group home in St. Paul, and his daughter is with the grandma. We're monitoring everything with his therapy and his living situation, and Sarah and I have been dropping in to make sure he has visitors."

"When he's stable enough for it, I'll find him a job," Alexander says. "He just needs an opportunity to provide for his family."

"The state is pressing charges on his behalf, right?" Tyson asks. "Or his mom is?"

"His family is, yeah," Amanda says. "And so am I, and so are Sarah and Julianna. Frank Arlington is going to jail for the rest of his natural life, probably."

Alexander sighs and rubs his fingers against the scar on Amanda's thigh, a two-inch-long line that Julianna and Sarah have too, the only mark of the control discs that had been implanted there. "We can't tie him to any of the teams or GMs," he says. "There just isn't a trail to find. They're going to get away with it."

JT scowls. "Well, we're on the lookout now," he says. "If anyone tries shit like this again, we'll be able to catch it and fucking fix it."

Amanda laughs. "There's a whole room in the house full of crazy computers that are keeping track of everything," she says. "Alexander's only allowed in it once a day. I don't want to lose him forever."

"Oh, man, I heard he hums when he comes out of the room," Tyson says. "You have to FaceTime me."

"I have video!" Amanda says. She presses a quick kiss to Alexander's protesting mouth, and then she gets up, beckoning Tyson to follow her while she goes to get her phone.

JT laughs as they walk away. "Hey," he says, sitting on the chaise next to Alexander's. "How's it going? Really, I mean."

"We mostly don't wake up with nightmares," Alexander says, shrugging. "There's a lot of therapy. Blake took personal leave from the Mariners for the last half of the season and spent it in the guest room, and I've seen more of early morning Phil Kessel than I think anyone deserves in a lifetime."

"So it's going well," JT says after a moment.

Alexander's eyes find Amanda when she laughs, pointing at her phone as she shows it to Tyson. "Yeah. You?"

JT looks at them, too, Amanda pushing her hair behind her ear, Tyson laughing with her; he looks beyond them, to Zach sitting happily with his wife, to Eichs standing victoriously behind the grill with the tongs as Morgan points at it, to the rest of the people who have become his team just as much as his original team was spread around the lawn.

"Yeah," JT says, settling back against the chaise. It's almost impossible to comprehend the changes the last year has brought, but Amanda's here, he's going to joke around with Zach's wife at Zach's expense before the party is over, and when he goes to sleep tonight, Tyson will be curled up with him. He smiles. "Yeah. It's going well."

**Author's Note:**

> **additional warnings:** the mystery part of the story revolves around one of JT's former superhero teammates, blink, who everyone assumes died. she is, in fact, not dead and never was; it was all a convincing illusion. she spends much of the last third of the story kicking ass and taking names.
> 
> -why those people? those are the ones i wanted. i don't know, dude. please suspend your disbelief and pretend they all went to umich. (jt and zach did actually play there together!)
> 
> -i came up with every single super name before i came up with their powers. please do yourselves a favour and do it the other way around, should you ever decide to write a superhero story.
> 
> -jt is SO ANNOYING the first week after tyson finds out about his powers. he freezes everything just for the fun of it. he forgot that he liked his power, okay, and he liked being able to use it again.
> 
> -readers were split 50/50 on whether or not they called ej as denverite, and i'm curious to know if others figured it out. please let me know!
> 
> -i'm on twitter! if you follow me there, please let me know who you are, as i don't accept random follower requests :)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Fanart for super, hero by somehowunbroken](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21250046) by [Actual_Dunwich_Horror](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Actual_Dunwich_Horror/pseuds/Actual_Dunwich_Horror)


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